The Man with the Longest Beard Ever: Hans Langseth, 1912

Hans Langseth was a Norwegian-American farmer who holds the record for the longest beard in history, with his facial hair measured at 17 feet and 6 inches (5.33m) long at his death on November 10th, 1927. Following his funeral, Hans’ son chopped the beard off and kept it stored in a box in his attic for 30 years before donating it to the Department of Anthropology at the Smithsonian Institution in 1967.

The photo above, colorized by JHLCOLORIZING, shows Hans Langseth with his beard draped over his shoulder at the age of 66 in circa 1912.

As beard hair can typically only grow a few feet before dying off, Hans would intertwine the hair in a coil so that it would keep growing.

Born in Eidsvoll, Norway, on July 14th, 1846, Langseth moved to the United States as a young man and settled in Kensett, Iowa, with his wife Anne and had six children. Following the death of his wife, Hans moved to Glyndon, Minnesota, and then to Barney, North Dakota, where he spent the remainder of his life until his death at the age of 81 in 1927.

Langseth explained that, in Eidsvoll, it was customary to grow a beard during winter and shave it off in spring. He followed this practice until age 29 when he “just wanted to see how long it would grow.”

In 1922, Langseth won a competition staged to find the longest beard in the United States and was honored at the “Days of ’49” event in Sacramento, California. He was presented with a gold medal and $300. His beard at the time was 17 feet long, and his closest competitor’s was 12 feet long.

Some sources claim that Hans Langseth’s beard was actually 18 feet and 6 inches (5.64m) long at the time of his death, but 12 inches (30cm) was left on him when he was buried. The 17 feet and 6 inches (5.33m) of beard that was cut off went on display at the Smithsonian Museum’s anthropology exhibit from 1967 to 1991 and is now kept in storage.

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