MAKERS OF STRANGE RECORDS

Gisborne Times, Volume LXXXVI, Issue 13092, 13 February 1937, Page 9

MAKERS OF STRANGE RECORDS

AMERICANS LEAD THE WORLD. FEATS OF SKILL AT SIMPLE TASKS. D° you know who nro the dishwashing, corn-eating, remembering, ice-cream modelling, pig-raising and trick golf-shooting champions of America, for 1930? Probably not. Their ability to ho outstanding in their own fields does not reap the financial windfalls that come with championships in tho well-known sports or contests, but still they are amazing enough to record. Tako Miss Sylvia Bolder, for example. She’s champion in an important, line of endeavour . . . dish-wash-

ing. She won tho title in competition with .19 selected opponents from all sections in a. recent Better Homes

Exposition in Los Angeles. Just picture Clarence Olander or Gerry Brand trying to wash and dry 20 dishes and 10 cups in 3 minutes and 21 seconds fiat. -Can’t you hear those slippery plates cracking on the floor?

Next. wo. count to champion Ed Kottwitz. Ho recently sat down with some of tho best eaters that could be found around Ortonville. Minnesota, and began eating luscious. tender hoilc-d mealies. Everybody in the contest ate and ate some. morn, until finally nobody but Ed was left.

He had cleaned up an even .Vi ears before he decided to stop, topping his nearest competitor by six ears. He calmly and modestly said that he might have eaten more if lie didn’t have to go home and do tho evening milking and . . . if he hadn't happened to have had mealies for lunch!

Can vmi imagine what would happen to wrestling champion Jim Londos if he. ate that much corn before match and his opponent, decided to hold him in a nice tight leg scissors ?

Tiien, thr> - e is Mr Bernard Zufall,of Forest Hills. New York, who would ho a. joy to any wife. There would be no more, worrying about that lettei she wanted mailed or the loaf of bread and bottle of milk hubby was told to bring home, for supper. ■Mr Zufall is the champion rememberer, or. if one wants to lie technical, a specialist, in mnemonics, tlio science of artificial memory. Ho can recall, instantly, the population of every city over 5000 in Dio United States, for the years 1909, 1910, 1920 and 1930. Without- a moment's hesitation lie can toll you Dm date of every important battle, every major Biblical or historical event. Or lr can name the dav of the week of any given date since 1752.

Mr Zufall works for a big elc-ctrio company whoso sales catalogue lists somA 20.000 items. From memory he can recite the items; prices, sizes, and other details concerning them. Bart of his job is selling, and lie can toll every customer on bis route what h , or she has purchased from the company as far back as 15 years, wiihcut referring to the records.

After looking at a 200-page magazine for an hour. Mr Zufall can recite from memory the name of every story or article, the author, tho, illustrations, the advertisements on each page, and the prices mentioned in them !

After thumbing a deck of cards, tho champion romamlioror can allow someone to shuffle and the deck and then l.c can instantly replace them as they wore. Fifty people can show him assorted coins and 10 minutes later he can name the denomination of each coin and Die date to he found on it!

Equally astonishing in another field is F. J. Roberts, foreman of the creamery at, Purdue Univarsitv, Lafayette. Indiana. He is probably the world’s best at sculpturing . . . with ice-cream. Rv taking a gallon or so each, of vanilla, chocolate, pistachio, strawberry, and lemon ice cream, he, can model a- landscape with perfection in all the colours, forms, and scale. A rural scene ho did, not, so long ago, showing a. country homestead with trees, snow, mountains, and a, rail fence, was voted a perfect job of unique artistry. The only bad feature about Roberts’s good models is that they can’t be save'd for posterity.

Among the list of unsung champions wo have to mention the name et Jack Redman. He’s a trick golf shot champion and is well worth watching when ho starts to perform. Driving one of the* tiny white pellets off the crystal of your watch would be “duck soup” for him. He guarantees that the watch will he returned in perfect condition. He can drive a hall off a girl’s knew with just as much ease.

A predecessor of the modem champions and one whose record still remains intact, is Adolph Toeppcrwein, of San Antonio, Texas. Ho is a crack shot with a, rifle and set a record many years ago that, sounds unbelievable. He bad a single-shot .22 calibre rifle when lie, decided to see how many hits ho could record. His targets were wooden blocks cut, to 2J- inches cubed. When ha got through it airing his targets, lie found he had 72,500 blocks. So he. began shooting them, one a.t a time, as they were thrown into tho air. Ho kept shooting for ten days. When lie finished he had put in 73J hours of continuous shooting and had hit 72,491 out of 72,500! Since that time no cue has come anywhere near his record.