Guinness World Records facts for kids
The Guinness World Records logo
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| Author | Craig Glenday (ed.) |
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| Cover artist | Simon Jones |
| Language | English, Arabic, Portuguese, Mandarin Chinese, Croatian, Czech, Danish, Dutch, Estonian, Finnish, French, German, Greek, Hebrew, Hungarian, Icelandic, Italian, Japanese, Latvian, Norwegian, Polish, Russian, Slovene, Slovak, Spanish, Swedish, Turkish and Bulgarian |
| Series | Guinness World Records |
| Subject | World Records |
| Genre | Information |
| Publisher | Jim Pattison Group |
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Publication date
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1955–present |
| Pages | 288 (2011,2012) 287 (2010) 288 (2003–2009) 289 (2008) |
| ISBN | 978-1-904994-67-1 |
The Guinness World Records book comes out every year. It's full of amazing world records. These include incredible things people have done and extreme facts about nature. Guess what? The book itself holds a record! It's the best-selling book series ever. It's also one of the most popular books, often borrowed from libraries in the United States.
Until the year 2000, it was known as The Guinness Book of Records. In some older U.S. versions, it was called The Guinness Book of World Records.
How the Book Started
On May 4, 1951, a man named Sir Hugh Beaver was at a party. He worked for Guinness Breweries. He got into an argument about which game bird in Europe was the fastest. Was it the golden plover or the grouse?
That evening, he realized he couldn't find the answer in any books. Sir Hugh thought about how many arguments like this happened every night in pubs. There was no book to settle these debates about records. He realized that a book with answers to these kinds of questions would be very popular.
Norris and Ross McWhirter were asked to create the book. They ran a company in London that found facts. In August 1954, the very first book was made. One thousand copies were printed and given away for free.
The first official book had 197 pages. It was finished on August 27, 1955. By Christmas that year, it was the best-selling book in Britain. The next year, it came to the U.S. and sold 70,000 copies! The book was so popular that the company decided to make a new, updated edition every year. They usually publish it in October, just in time for Christmas shopping.
Amazing Records Inside
Newer editions of the book often focus on amazing things people have done. These include records for weightlifting or the longest egg tossing distance. There are also records for playing video games, like Grand Theft Auto IV, or for eating a lot of hot dogs quickly. Some types of records, like those involving too much eating or drinking, are no longer accepted. This is likely for safety reasons.
Besides competition records, the book also has facts about nature and other topics. You can find records for the heaviest tumor or the most poisonous plant. It lists the shortest river (Roe River) and the longest-running TV drama in the USA (Guiding Light). It also includes the longest-serving actors in TV shows, like William Roache in Coronation Street and Ray Meagher in Home and Away. The world's most successful salesman, Joe Girard, is also in the book.
Each year's book has a selection of records from a huge database. The way they choose which records to include has changed over time. They always add the newest records and update any records that have been broken.
In 2005, Guinness started International Guinness World Records Day on November 9. This day encourages people to try and break world records. In 2006, about 100,000 people in over 10 countries took part. In February 2008, the TV channel NBC showed a special called The Top 100 Guinness World Records of All Time. You can find the full list on the Guinness World Records website.
Images for kids
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Norris McWhirter co-founded the book with his twin brother Ross in August 1955.
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Japanese competitive eater Takeru Kobayashi with two Guinness World Record certificates.
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The North Beach (Nazaré, Portugal) is listed in Guinness World Records for the biggest waves ever surfed.
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Sultan Kösen (Turkey) is the tallest living person, growing to 8ft 3inch, as confirmed by Guinness World Records.
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Chandra Bahadur Dangi (Nepal) was recognized as the world's shortest man ever by Guinness World Records.
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Fiann Paul, Alex Gregory and Carlo Facchino aboard Polar Row, a very record-breaking expedition.
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The Guinness Museum in Hollywood.
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Suresh Joachim Arulanantham is a Canadian film actor and producer. He holds over 50 world records, often to help children in need. Here he is about to break the ironing world record at 2 days, 7 hours and 5 minutes.
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See also
In Spanish: Libro Guinness de los récords para niños
