Uncle John’s Curiously Compelling Bathroom Reader Read Online Free PDF Page A

was anything having to do with crime or hard liquor (the book was sponsored by a brewery, so some beer-related records were permitted). They did allow many categories that were inherently dangerous, such as sword swallowing and fire eating, but as people attempted to break those records, the McWhirters became concerned that people might actually kill themselves in the attempt…and Guinness would be to blame. So in the late 1970s they started to “retire” (and later revive) some of the more dangerous categories. Here are a few examples:
    HOT-WATER-BOTTLE BURSTING
    Record Holder: Italian actor and bodybuilder Franco Columbu Details: Using only his lung power, in August 1979, Columbu inflated a rubber hot-water bottle to the bursting point (28.5 pounds per square inch of air pressure) in 23 seconds.
    What Happened: Columbu’s name and record made it into the 1980 edition, but by the 1981 edition they were gone, replaced with the following notice: “Contests involving the bursting of hot-water bottles with sheer lung power are regarded as medically most inadvisable, and the category has been discontinued.”
    Update: For a while Guinness replaced hot-water-bottle bursting with weather-balloon blowing, but today the hot-water bottles are back in. The current record holder is George Christen, who, in 2000, inflated a hot-water bottle to the bursting point in 52.68 seconds—almost 30 seconds slower than Columbu’s record.
Foreign rulers: French revolutionaries invented the metric system.
    BURIAL ALIVE (VOLUNTARY)
    Record Holder: Hendrick Luypaerts of Hechtel, Belgium
    Details: In April 1974, Luypaerts climbed into a coffin 6'6" long, 33½" wide, and 25" deep, and was buried alive beneath almost 10 feet of dirt. He stayed there for 101 days and 37 minutes, with only a small tube for air, water, food, and…uh…bathroom needs connecting him to the surface. ( Guinness says the record for involuntary burial alive is six years and five months, set by two Polish men who were trapped in a demolished World War II bunker from January 1945 until June 1951.)
    What Happened: In 1979 the Guinness referees announced that future claims would be inadmissable “unless the depth of the coffin is a minimum two meters below ground with a maximum length of two meters, width of 70 centimeters, height of 100 centimeters, and a maximum aperture of 10 centimeters for feeding and communication.” Then the following year they dumped the category altogether.
    Update: In 1998 a British man named Geoff Smith broke the record by staying underground for 147 days in honor of his deceased mother, who had set the European record of being buried alive for 101 days. But Guinness refused to recognize Smith’s attempt, saying the category was too dangerous. Smith had to settle for recognition from Ripley’s Believe It or Not , but says he doesn’t mind. “Although the feat is not recognized by Guinness , everyone in the world knows who I am now after what I’ve done,” he says.
    Related Note: The category “Most Cockroaches in a Coffin” is still open. Any takers? (You have to get in the coffin with the cockroaches.) Current record: 20,050 cockroaches.
    SWORD SWALLOWING
    Record Holder: “Count Desmond” of Binghamton, New York
    Details: Desmond set the record in 1981 by swallowing thirteen 23" swords, but injured himself in the process.
    What Happened: Guinness officials acknowledged the attempt …then retired the category. “We don’t want Count Desmond trying any more, saying he cut his guts out for Guinness ,” the book’s American editor, David Boehm, explained.
Frightening fact: Phobatrivaphobia is a fear of trivia about phobias.
    Update: As of 1999, sword swallowing is back in, with a twist—literally. The new category is called “Most Swords Swallowed and Twisted.” Current record holder: Brad Byers of Moscow, Idaho. On August 13, 1999, he swallowed ten 27" swords and rotated them a full 180° in his esophagus. But, according to