Don Koehler: A history of the world's tallest people

Don Koehler, a friendly American forklift salesman from Chicago, was the undisputed tallest man in the world from 1969 to 1981. Don – who stood 8 ft 2 in (249 cm) tall – was able to balance widespread fame with as normal and comfortable a life as he could have hoped for.

Early life

Don Albert Koehler was born in the small mountain town of Hardin, Montana, on 1 September 1925 – fifteen minutes after his twin sister, Donna Marie. His parents, Albert and Lucille (nee Zachow), were both from Wisconsin but had settled in Hardin a few years earlier when Albert came there to work as a pharmacist.

It’s worth mentioning that his name was just “Don” – that’s what was written on his birth certificate. It wasn’t short for Donald, despite what many editors and writers (including several of our own) have assumed in the past.

Don and Donna were both reportedly healthy and developmentally normal as infants. The family moved back to the Midwest in the summer of 1926, settling first in Milwaukee and then moving to Chicago's North Side, where the family would put down roots.

According to interviews he gave in the 1950s, Don grew normally until he was around 10 years old, at which point he started to soar above his peers. As his father was 6 ft 2 in (187 cm) and his mother 5 ft 10 in (177 cm), this wasn't that unexpected, but it quickly became apparent that something unusual was going on.

Like many people with pituitary gland disorders, Don's rate of growth was apparently inconsistent. Between the ages of 10 and 12 he rose from a more or less normal height for his age (presumably around 5 ft/152 cm) to a height of roughly 6 ft 4 in (193 cm). However, by the time he was 16, his height had only increased to 6 ft 8 in (203 cm).

Growing pains

His near-seven-foot height was enough to frustrate his hopes of joining the military, which would have been at the forefront of a patriotic teenager's mind in 1942. In an interview with a Chicago Tribune reporter from July of that year, the tall Reserve Officer Training Corps cadet ruefully reeled off the height limits of the different branches of the US military, "six foot three in the marine corps, six foot four in the navy. [The Army is] six-six, isn't it?".

After graduating from high school – by then slightly over 7 ft (213 cm) tall – Don was seemingly at a loose end. His size made it hard for him to get a normal job, but he equally didn't like the idea of travelling with a circus and exhibiting himself. He got a job working for a paper company in Wisconsin, but as his height continued to rise – it reached 8 ft 2 in (249 cm) when he was in his mid 20s – he became increasingly withdrawn and self-conscious.

An illustration of Don

Around 1950, at the urging of his sister Donna, he joined a local association called the Paramont Tall Club, which had formed in 1946 as a social club for men over 6 ft 3 in (190 cm) and women over 5 ft 10 in (177 cm). Encouraged by this supportive community, who made him their master of ceremonies, Don became more outgoing and gregarious.

“Mr Giant”, the tallest young man in America

As his reputation spread, Don began doing promotional work for businesses around the Chicago area; he would visit a car dealership, for example, as part of a stunt designed to show off how roomy a new model was. Crucially for him, at these appearances he was not a distant figure to be gawked at, but rather an ambassador who worked rooms and talked to people. By 1952 he was travelling across the country to make personal appearances at promotional events.

In 1953, the Big Joe Forklift Company – who had hired him a few times for publicity stunts – offered Don a full time job as a sales representative. This wasn't simply a way to get a promotional mascot on the payroll; Don's charm and easy way with people had impressed his bosses, and they wanted him to join their sales team. He remained at Big Joe's until his retirement in 1978, and was by all accounts a successful salesman.

While Don was undoubtedly the tallest person in the world from 1969 to 1981, it can be argued that he had held the title since around 1950. It certainly seems likely that there was a period in the early 1950s when his height had exceeded that of the aging Väinö Myllyrinne, but John Carroll (who was seven years younger) had not yet overtaken him. Plus, John Carroll’s extreme scoliosis meant that while his anatomical height was 8 ft 7.75 in (263 cm), his standing height was “only” 8 ft (243.8 cm).

Don appears to have deferred to Carroll’s claim, however. In interviews given in the 1950s and 1960s, he would describe himself as only the second-tallest person in America. He never referred to John Carroll by name in these interviews, but it’s not clear whether that’s because he didn't know much about his rival (Carroll was only referred to as “The Buffalo Giant” in medical journals), or because he respected the publicity-shy Buffalo Giant’s desire to maintain a low profile.

Worldwide fame

With John Carroll's death in 1969, Don became the undisputed tallest living man, and was happy to accept the attention that came with it. He was the subject of several newspaper and magazine profiles, he appeared on TV chat shows and was the subject of an episode of David Frost's Guinness World Records Hall of Fame TV show.

Don Koehler with GWR's founders, Ross and Norris McWhirter, in the early 1970s

As he got older, Don began to experience the sorts of health issues common to extremely tall people, including gradually increasing curvature of the spine (which reduced his standing height by around four inches) and cardiac problems.

In an interview with the Chicago Tribune in the mid 1970s, however, he mentioned that the most difficult aspect of these problems was trying to keep doctors focused on him as a patient – addressing the specific health issue that was bothering him – and not on him as an unusual medical case study. He quickly tired of answering endless questions about his overall health and development.

Don retired from Big Joe's in 1978 due to his declining health. He lived in a spacious apartment in a three-unit building that he owned, and spent a lot of time with his sister and her family, who lived nearby. He died on 25 February 1981, reportedly of heart problems related to his condition.