Alton is a city on the Mississippi River in Madison County, Illinois, United States, about 18 miles (29 km) north of St. Louis, Missouri. The population was 25,676 at the 2020 census. It is a part of the River Bend area in the Metro-East region of the Greater St. Louis metropolitan area.
Martin Van Buren Bates, known as the Kentucky Giant, was an American man notable for his great height. He was 7 ft 9 in (2.36 m) tall and weighed 475 lb (215 kg).
Anna Haining Bates was a Canadian woman notable for her great stature of 7 feet 11 inches (2.41 m). She was one of the tallest women who ever lived. Her parents were of average height and were Scottish immigrants.
Leonid Stepanovych Stadnyk was a Ukrainian man who claimed to have stood at 2.57 m though photographic evidence suggests he was not taller than 7 ft 7 in (2.31 m).
Eddie Carmel was an American entertainer, born in British Mandate Palestine with gigantism and subsequent acromegaly resulting from a pituitary adenoma. He was popularly known as "The Jewish Giant", "The Happy Giant," and "The World's Biggest Cowboy."
Väinö Myllyrinne was a Finnish acromegalic giant who was at one time (1940–1963) the world's tallest living person, and may have become the tallest after the death of Robert Wadlow. He stood 224 cm and weighed 141 kg at the age of 21, but experienced a second phase of growth in his late thirties, attaining a height of 251 cm.
Zeng Jinlian was a Chinese teenage girl who is the tallest woman verified in modern times, surpassing Jane Bunford's record. Following the death of Don Koehler, Zeng was the tallest living person from 1981 to 1982, during which time she surpassed fellow "eight-footers" Gabriel Estêvão Monjane and Suleiman Ali Nashnush.
Shurtleff College was a Baptist liberal arts school in Alton, Illinois until 1957.
John Francis Carroll was an American giant and one of 23 known people in medical history to have reached a height of 8 feet (240 cm). He suffered from severe, 2-dimensional spinal curvature (Kyphoscoliosis) and acromegalic gigantism. He had a standing height of 8 ft 1⁄4 in (244 cm) on October 14, 1959, at age 27, but according to calculations, his height would have been 8 ft 8 in (264 cm), assuming normal curvature of the spine. In 1968, he was later measured at 7 ft 10+1⁄2 in (240 cm), having shrunk in stature due to his worsening spinal condition.
John Aasen was an American silent film actor and sideshow performer who was one of the tallest actors in history.
Vikas Kumar "Vicky" Uppal was a native and resident of India, said to be India's tallest man until his death on 30 June 2007 when he died during a failed brain tumor operation in Delhi. In 2004, The Tribune reported him to be 2.46 m tall and still growing, being in his late teens.
Clifford Marshall Thompson was one of the world's tallest men, the world's tallest lawyer, and remains the tallest man to ever appear in a Hollywood film.
Sultan Kösen is a Turkish farmer who holds the Guinness World Record for tallest living male at 251 cm.
Wadlow is an English surname. Notable people with the surname include:
John Rogan, was an American sharecropper who was recorded as the tallest non-mobile person ever, and the second-tallest person ever at 8 feet 9 inches (267 cm), behind Robert Wadlow.
Alton Community Unit School District #11 in Madison County, Illinois is a public school district consisting of seven elementary schools, one high school, one middle school, an early childhood center, and an alternative education school.
The Alton Museum of History and Art, sometimes known as the Robert Wadlow Museum, in Alton, Illinois was founded in 1971 as a not for profit organization. It is located in Loomis Hall, named for Rev. Hubbel Loomis, on the grounds of the former Rock Spring Alton Baptist Seminary established by missionary John Mason Peck, later renamed Shurtleff College, and presently the home of the Southern Illinois University School of Dental Medicine. The building, which has Underground Railroad history, was constructed as the original chapel/classroom of the seminary c.1820 and the sanctuary was modified in the early 1900s to be a two-story building with a rear classroom and laboratory addition. The building is the state's second oldest remaining college building.
Jakob Hudson Nacken or Jacob Nacken was a German circus performer active in Europe and the United States. He began his career as an exceptionally tall person while a teenager, performing in a traveling circus, and appeared in the 1939 New York World's Fair. Nacken was the tallest soldier in the German Army during World War II at a height of seven feet three inches (2.21 m). He was employed as a giant Santa Claus and appeared on American television as a figure of high stature and in freak shows as the World's Tallest Man.
Siddiqa Parveen was an Indian woman listed by Guinness World Records as the tallest living woman. She was also the tallest Indian woman in recorded history at 7 ft 8 in (2.34 m).
