Jack Earle was an American silent cinema actor and sideshow performer (July 3, 1906 — July 18, 1952). For the record, Earle testified in March 1939 (during the Wadlow/Humberd trial) that he was 7 feet, 6.5 inches tall. Born Jacob Rheuben Ehrlich, his real height is believed to be 7 feet 6 inches. His fingers were so thick (each the diameter of a 50-cent piece), he had to use a pencil to spin a telephone dial and he weighed at least 360 pounds.
His Giant Size
According to The Life of Jack Earle, written by Dean Jennings, his enormous arms, which extended a whopping seven feet and four inches when he opened them, resembled the outriggers of a fishing boat. His massive pipe resembled an orchard smudge pot, and his bony hands were bigger than ping pong paddles, allowing him to span his hands two octaves on a piano. He wore size 22 shoes and weighed 395 pounds at some point in 1940.
Each of his clothes included eight yards of fabric, and his fingers were so thick that he couldn’t fit them in a telephone dial. During his 14 years as a freak in the Ringling Brothers, Barnum & Bailey Circus, Jack Earle hated himself and the people who stared at him because he was a true giant in a Lilliputian world. During the shows, he could wear a giant fur busby that rose 16 inches above his head.
His chest circumference was 51 inches and his head circumference was 24 inches, according to Rowe AW and Mortimer H’s endocrine studies published in 1934. He went to build a $20,000 house with a nine-foot ceiling and baths with eight-foot-high shower heads. One of the things he hated most in his life was hitting his head on the 7-foot-high ceiling of elevators.
Jack Earle’s Early Life
Doctors initially thought Jack Earle wouldn’t make it since he was so little at birth (just 3 pounds, 12 ounces). Jacob was born to Polish Jews in Denver, Colorado, and he was always smaller and frailer than his friends up to the age of 7.
From that moment on, however, he grew at a phenomenal pace, reaching heights of over six feet by the time he was 10 years old. This was due to a tumor in his brain, specifically at the pituitary gland where growth hormone is secreted.
He was afraid of scaring people with his towering stature, so he would avoid them on his route to school by using back alleyways. He and his family settled in El Paso, Texas, where he earned the moniker “Pecos Bill,” a fictional cowboy and folk hero, and he loved it for the rest of his life.
His Show Career
As a young man, he was scouted by Hollywood producers, who offered him a profession in which he could star in comedies. Comedy shows with tall people were extremely popular at the time, similar to the case of Henry Hite, the comedian “Corn King Giant” at 7’7″.
When he was thirteen and visiting Los Angeles with his father, a film production firm named Century Comedies took notice of his stature (he was over seven feet tall), and producers and directors Jerry Ash and Zion Meyers offered him a job. He appeared in 48 motion pictures, including “Jack and the Beanstalk,” and doubled in many movies for full-grown men.
He adopted the screen name Jack Earle and began acting in silent films. Over the following three years, he continued to work in the film industry while still juggling education, appearing in 28 short movies and 2 long movies; almost all of them were comedies. He was an uncredited troupe actor in Stop, Look, and Listen (1926) and the smuggler in Peg o’ the Mounted (1924).
The Accident
Up until Earle was injured in a fall from a scaffold during the production, he had produced almost fifty shows and movies. After breaking his nose, he was in the hospital and a tumor in his pituitary gland had been detected overnight. When he awoke, he saw that his peripheral eyesight was deteriorating, and at some point, he became blind.
It was discovered by a doctor that the enlarged pituitary tumor was pushing on Earle’s optic nerve. In a miracle of miracles, doctors were able to save his eyesight and halt his extraordinary development after attempting to reduce the size of the tumor using X-rays. After four months of radiation therapy, his vision improved, but his growth was stunted due to the shrinking gland.
Jack Earle as a Circus Freak
During his freshman year at college, he went to visit the Ringling Brothers and Barnum & Bailey Circus, where he was introduced to Jim G. Tarver, “the tallest man in the world,” also known as the “Texas Giant”. This circus was famous for having most of the living American giants at the time to showcase “freaks, curiosities, and oddities.”
Jack Earle joined the circus and spent the next 14 years on the road with them, all while towering above Tarver, who was billed at 8’4″ but was 7’3″ in reality.
Treasure Island authorities officially later chose Giant Jack Earle as the 1939–1940 Golden Gate International Exposition’s goodwill ambassador to the Antipodes.
During an exhibition, General Electric provided him with a giant Mazda lamp of 50,000 watts, which was the world’s largest incandescent lamp. This lamp was bigger than one-third of Jack’s body length. In the same photograph, Major Mite, the world’s smallest living man, also held a tiny grain-of-wheat lamp.
He drove his car from the back seat but much of his journeying was done by airplane. He was accustomed to such inconveniences after traveling the world for 21 years. The man weighed almost 400 pounds despite “not eating more than anybody else.” He was seen by millions of circusgoers, before whom he appeared in a 10-gallon hat and cowboy boots. He even registered for the World War II draft and probably didn’t draft due to his size.
The World’s Tallest Salesman
Jack Earle left the circus around the age of 40 after being around the world eight times and driving 40,000 miles a year, which exhausted him at some point. He worked for the Roma Wine Company for the next several years and became a famous itinerant salesperson known for his imagination and originality. Extremely tall people like Jack were often used as salespeople.
During his life, he never drove more than 50 miles an hour. What was outlying is that Jack was also a writer, watercolor painter, sculptor, and photographer who won awards for his work. The Long Shadows was the title of his first poetry collection, released in 1952. American musician Tom Waits’ song “Get Behind the Mule” has a reference to Jack Earle.
His Death
At age 46, Jack Earle passed away in El Paso, Texas in 1952. According to doctors, he lived longer than most other giants in history. His death was due to his kidney’s inability to function. Eight pallbearers were used at his funeral instead of the typical six.
