On world record day, celebrate Arizona's teeter-totter champions
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Illustration: Annelise Capossela/Axios
When it comes to Arizona's place in the world record books, sometimes what goes up must come down.
Driving the news: Today is Guinness World Records Day.
Flashback: On Aug. 31, 1971, four Arizona boys ages 12–15 set a new world teeter-totter record after spending 177.5 hours — nearly 7.5 days — continuously seesawing, The Arizona Republic, Associated Press and United Press International all reported.
- Brothers Danny, Scott and Steve Waddell and Kenny Wright worked in shifts of two to stay rested enough to keep going — no easy feat considering they were contending with summer heat.
- The previous record was 170.5 hours.
- "We proved to our dad that when we start something … we can finish it," Danny said.
Yes, but: Others have been credited with longer records.
- Two men in Concord, California, rode a seesaw continuously for 216 hours in 2021. And one of the men, 68-year-old Chuck Walker, was credited in July 1971 — less than two months before the four Arizonans — with setting a new teeter-totter record that was 10 minutes less than the 2021 record.
- They did take rare bathroom breaks, but "never stopped moving — not even for sleep, which they take turns doing for just a few hours at a time," ABC 7 News reported.
The intrigue: We're not sure what accounts for the conflicting records.
- The California record was with two people and the Arizona record was four.
- The only teeter-totter marathon record recognized by Guinness is 75 hours and 10 minutes, set in Washington in 2004.
- The Guinness entry notes that the record-keepers only accept entries from people at least 16 years old, so that would exclude the Arizonans anyway.
The bottom line: Either way, the four Arizona teens were immortalized as teeter-totter champs 54 years ago.
Meanwhile, Arizonans have set other still-standing records, per Guinness World Records.
- We had the world's largest serving of salsa and the longest chimichanga, fitting for a state with such great Mexican food.
- Scottsdale in 2014 hosted the world's largest UFO convention.
- Since 2017, ASU has been home to the world's most valuable insect collection.
- And Michael Nilsen of Gilbert owns the world's largest collection of Power Rangers memorabilia.