[Archive Obituary] Robert Earl Hughes, World's Heaviest Man, 32
DGH
World's Heaviest Man remembered as small-town boy
FISHHOOK [Missouri] -- Robert Earl Hughes' weight was both a prison and
a passkey.
The memorial for Robert Earl Hughes sits at Fishhook's main
intersection. Jennifer Coombes/Quincy Herald-Whig
An infant case of whooping cough shook his pituitary gland, triggering
his girth to explode. Robert Earl weighed more than 200 pounds at age
6, nearly double that at age 10 and more than a half-ton by his 30s.
For most of his life, his size left him immobile and home-bound in a
tiny farming community. But his girth also served as his ticket out of
western Illinois: as a carnival fat man, Robert Earl got to see more
of America than most poor folk could imagine.
That's why in Fishhook, residents always remember Robert Earl with a
smile on his face. Fifty years after his early death, folks still
fondly recall the small-town boy who became The World's Heaviest Man.
Robert Earl's hold on Fishhook -- a town 20 miles east of Hannibal,
Missouri, with a population of 29 -- remains remarkable, even a half-
century after he last walked these parts. Catty-corner from Fishhook
Market, the only store in the business district, a four-foot-tall slab
of black granite juts out of the earth. It hosts a light etching of a
large man in overalls, his face beaming a genial smile as he leans on
a thick cane for needed support. Underneath is this message:
"May we not only remember he was the world's largest man from the
small community of Fishhook, but also an average man with an enormous
heart for people."
The memorial went up only last year, after the small community somehow
came up with $3,500.
"In the summer, there'll be somebody stopping by to look at it every
day," says Jerry Dougherty, who owns Fishhook Market.
* * *
In 1926 in Monticello, Missouri, along came an 11 1/4-pound boy named
Robert Earl Hughes, the first child of Georgia Hughes, 20, and Abe
Hughes, 48. A sharecropper, Abe Hughes eked out a subsistence living.
Soon after Robert Earl's birth, he cut a new deal outside Fishhook.
The tiny family had no running water or electricity, but the land was
cheap.
At 5 months old, Robert Earl started coughing fiercely and
persistently, a sign of whooping cough. With no remedy available, the
family waited out the disease. The coughing eventually stopped but
left its mark in a big way.
Two years later, with Robert Earl growing far larger than the average
lad of that age, the family scratched together enough money to visit a
doctor. He had been healthy, except for that case of the whooping
cough. The doctor determined the cough had permanently discombobulated
Robert Earl's pituitary gland. Instead of regulating his growth
properly, the gland was prompting a runaway plumping.
For the next four years, Robert Earl kept expanding. One day, his
parents hitched up the horse and wagon to take him to town, to weigh
him on the platform scale at the general store. Though the 6-year-old
stood just slightly taller than average, the scale registered a
remarkable 203 pounds.
After starting first grade in a one-room schoolhouse several miles
away, the sociable boy liked interacting with children, far more than
he would typically see around his farmhouse. Over the years, though,
Robert Earl's burgeoning girth made the long walks to school
exhausting and excruciating. By age 10, his weight hit 378 pounds,
according to the scale at the general store. His trips into town
became something of a public spectacle, and word of his size began to
trickle through Pike, Adams and Brown counties.
But Robert Earl was not slothful. He gladly would help on the family
farm, feeding chickens, gathering eggs and performing other jobs that
could be done at a slow pace. All accounts peg him as a gregarious,
smiling youngster -- "a very jolly fellow," as former neighbor Harry
Manley, 84, described him.
Those close to Robert Earl say he did not eat like a pig. They say he
had a hearty appetite, perhaps enough to pack extra pounds onto any
person. But they say his meals were not so big as to account for his
enormous size.
Still, by age 13 he had reached an astounding 546 pounds. At school,
he sat on a special bench braced with two-by-fours and wire. But the
walk became risky. One day, he stumbled and rolled into a ditch. His
size rendered him unable to maneuver himself out. Friends ran for
help, summoning several men who used ropes to pull him to safety.
* * *
By age 16, the 5-foot, 9-inch boy weighed 600 pounds. Two years later,
he passed 709 pounds. That year, 1944, he had to register for the
draft. But his parents told the draft board that they had no way of
getting Robert Earl to registration in Mount Sterling, 12 miles away.
So, the draft board went to Fishhook to register him.
Stories about the unusual draft accommodations made papers in Quincy
and other nearby cities -- the first time Robert Earl made headlines.
The stories said Robert Earl, likely the largest man to register for
the draft, wore size 56 overalls, to which his mother had added a 17-
inch swatch of material.
These curiosities caught the eye of savvy marketers. Two years later,
at age 20, Robert Earl made his first public appearances, at festivals
in nearby Baylis and Meredosia. To get there, he rode in the back of
pickup trucks furnished by the festival organizers.
Robert Earl brought photos of himself to the festivals, which he sold
and autographed: 25 cents for a 3-inch-by-5-inch shot or 50 cents for
an 8-by-10. At the Baylis festival alone, he sold 160 photos and took
orders for more. He loved the attention, and offers soon poured in
from other festivals, promising $50 to $100 per day -- a princely sum
to a poor family of dirt farmers.
* * *
After his mother, who had disapproved of her son selling himself as a
freak, died of a stroke, a 21-year-old Robert Earl realized he no
longer could break her heart and decided to use his size to his
advantage.
Publicity allowed Robert Earl to make a good chunk of money. He made
appearances at grand openings and other functions in Illinois,
Missouri and Iowa. One store used his photo to tout custom-made
trousers it had fashioned for him. A tuxedo shop displayed a picture
of him grinning inside a massive penguin suit.
The money was nice. But mostly he liked the appearances for the
opportunity to meet people. As something of a celebrity at these
events, Robert Earl was meeting far more folks than anyone in Fishhook
might see in a lifetime.
In 1953, he stepped onto the platform scale at the Fishhook store,
hitting 946 pounds. Robert Earl likely was the heaviest man on earth
at that time.
The next year, Robert Earl signed his first carnival contract.
Fairgoers flocked to see the spectacle of the half-ton man: 25 cents
per adult, a dime for the kiddies. Despite the gawking, most fans
treated Robert Earl with respect. He didn't mind personal questions,
such as those about the size of his bed (six legs) and his ability to
tie his shoes (he could not).
* * *
Although he loved life on the road, Robert Earl sought more
opportunities. In late 1956, he hit 1,041 pounds. He had officially
become the World's Heaviest Man.
An East Coast publicist saw an angle there. He said Robert Earl was a
natural for variety shows hosted by the likes of Ed Sullivan, Jackie
Gleason and Steve Allen. The publicist offered $40,000, plus expenses.
An amazed Robert Earl agreed eagerly. But the logistics were tricky.
A private ambulance -- apparently, the only vehicle large enough for
Robert Earl to take a long-distance trip -- took him from Missouri to
Chicago's O'Hare Field. There, thanks to special permission from the
Civil Aeronautics Board, he would be allowed to board a freight
carrier.
Newspapers chided the spectacle. The Sun-Times asked in a headline,
"Will He Fit on TV Screen?"
Once in New York City, the publicist put up Robert Earl and a pair of
family friends in a swank hotel. Tailors arrived to take Robert Earl's
measurements for a special suit: He was to appear on TV as The World's
Largest Santa Claus.
But it never happened. Robert Earl never heard another word, not from
Ed Sullivan, not from the publicist, not from anyone. Soon, the hotel
kicked him out for failure to pay his bill. Robert Earl and his
companions were on the street, with no money or hope. They went to the
Salvation Army, which took pity and covered the large tab to fly him
back to the Midwest. He rarely talked of the matter again.
"He was pretty blue," his sister-in-law Lillian Hughes says. "He
thought he could trust people."
* * *
In 1957, Robert Earl joined the Gooding Amusement Co. for a Midwest
carnival tour. In early July, Robert Earl developed a skin rash. When
family members asked if he was all right, he replied, "You know, I
always have this heat in the summer." But days later, Robert Earl's
fingernails began to turn dark blue. His brother summoned a doctor,
who suspected a heart attack and told them to take Robert Earl to the
nearest hospital.
Weakened and unable to move, he was too big to transport into the
building. So physicians came out to the carnival trailer to examine
him. The diagnosis: the measles, possibly from his two nieces. The
disease was causing uremia, a kidney malfunction, and he was fading
fast.
Robert Earl would never leave that trailer -- not alive. He fell into a
coma and died two days later, on July 10, of congestive heart failure.
He was 32.
Robert Earl was not buried in an old piano case as per an apocryphal
story long published in the Guinness Book of World Records. Rather,
the Embalming Burial Case Co. of Burlington, Iowa, built a custom
casket: 85 inches long, 52 inches wide and 34 inches deep. It was made
of heavy cypress and reinforced with steel.
In Mount Sterling, a forklift hoisted Robert Earl's body off the
carnival trailer and into the casket. The funeral was the most-
attended in Brown County, with more than 2,000 mourners paying their
last respects to the World's Heaviest Man. Twelve pallbearers moved
the casket on rollers to the grave site, and a crane lowered the
casket into its final resting place.
A simple granite marker stands atop the grave: Robert Earl Hughes;
June 1, 1926-July 10, 1958; World's Heaviest Man; Weight 1,041
Pounds."
Those who know him say he likely was somewhat heavier at the time of
death. No matter, his record has been far eclipsed since then.
Not that they care in Fishhook. There, they still care about Robert
Earl Hughes -- not about the size of his waistline, but the size of his
heart and his smile.
All-time world weight records
The following list notes the top six heaviest people of all time as
well as his or her country of origin and birth and death years.
Carol Yager, U.S., 1960-94, more than 1,600 pounds
Jon Brower Minnoch, U.S.,1941-83, 1,400 pounds
Manuel Uribe, Mexico, born 1965, 1,235 pounds
Walter Hudson, U.S., 1944-91, 1,197 pounds
Michael Hebranko, U.S., born 1953, more than 1,100 pounds
Robert Earl Hughes, U.S., 1926-58, 1,069 pounds
Source: Wikipedia, based on news articles
http://www.sj-r.com/News/stories/26231.asp
E
Radioacti...@hotmail.com
what a surprising, even shocking, number of people these days seem to
forget--that Hughes and all of the other super-sized individuals
listed in that roster are all human beings.
No matter how they got that way, through their own indulgence or
illness (as was the case with Hughes), they're all people, worthy of
dignified treatment. Yet they're often referred to in the most vile
terms by some otherwise civilized types.
And that's the reason I've always been a defender of Richard Simmons,
who's devoted the second half of his career to tending to, with little
publicity, these types.
BRYAN STYBLE/Seattle
www.RadioactiveSeattle.blogspot.com
[newstalk radio blog]
DGH
Actually, the subject was supposed to includd "Archive Obituary", but
apparently, at least on Google (dejanews or Deja News), the "archive
obituary" was left off.
R H Draney
Google deletes anything in square brackets at the beginning of a subject line
when replying...it's all a part of their "we know better than you do what you
intend to say" policy....r
--
What good is being an executive if you never get to execute anyone?
Bob Feigel
Radioacti...@hotmail.com magnanimously proffered:
>Thanks; this bio of Robert Hughes was fascinating, and a reminder of
>what a surprising, even shocking, number of people these days seem to
>forget--that Hughes and all of the other super-sized individuals
>listed in that roster are all human beings.
Human beings?!?!? Now THAT'S an original thought ...
--
"It's not that I'm afraid to die. I just don't want to be there when it happens." - Woody Allen
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
Wax-up and drop-in of Surfing's Golden Years: <http://www.surfwriter.net>
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~