Name: The Smithsonian Measured a 7-Foot-6 Man in 1883. Where Is He?
Uploaded: 2026-10-10T00:00:00.000Z
Duration: 20 min 21 s
Description: In 1883 a Smithsonian field party opened a burial vault in West Virginia and measured a man seven feet six inches long, wearing twelve copper bracelets. The government printed the measurement twice. The bracelets are still in Washington, with a catalog number. This file asks what number they gave him.

The Giants in the Mounds

In 1883 a Smithsonian field party opened a burial vault in West Virginia and measured a man seven feet six inches long, wearing twelve copper bracelets. The government printed the measurement twice. The bracelets are still in Washington, with a catalog number. This file asks what number they gave him.

The Allegedly Files present historical records as they were filed. Nothing here is confirmed. Nothing here is denied.

Newspaper clippings in the Smithsonian montage courtesy of The Archivist, @1_analog_9 on X.

Sources

Thomas, Cyrus. "Burial Mounds of the Northern Sections of the United States." Fifth Annual Report of the Bureau of Ethnology, 1883–84. Washington: GPO, 1887. P. 52.
Thomas, Cyrus. "Report on the Mound Explorations of the Bureau of Ethnology." Twelfth Annual Report of the Bureau of Ethnology, 1890–91. Washington: GPO, 1894. Pp. 117, 302, 335, 361–362, 419, 425–427.
Dragoo, Don W. Mounds for the Dead: An Analysis of the Adena Culture. Annals of Carnegie Museum 37. Pittsburgh, 1963.
Webb, William S., and Charles E. Snow. The Adena People. University of Kentucky Reports in Anthropology and Archaeology 6. Lexington, 1945. And Webb and Snow, The Dover Mound, 1959.
Smithsonian Institution, National Museum of Natural History, Department of Anthropology. Public catalog, accession 014255 (Bureau of American Ethnology, 1884), Smith Mound, Kanawha County, WV: USNM A90737-0, A90738-0, A90739-0, A90740-0, A90748-0. Accessed 1 Oct 2026.
Smithsonian Institution. Human Remains Task Force Report. 10 Jan 2024.
Spirit of Democracy (Woodsfield, OH), 11 Dec 1883. Daily Bulletin (Honolulu), 22 May 1884. Wheeling Register, 9 Apr 1902.
Memphis Daily Appeal, 28 Aug 1870; Columbia Herald, 16 Sep 1870; Buchanan County Bulletin, 4 Nov 1870.
West Virginia Freeman, 4 Mar 1885. Canton Weekly Register, 5 Sep 1907. Daily Tobacco Leaf-Chronicle, 15 Apr 1890.
New York Herald, 25 Oct 1869. New-York Tribune, 7 Dec 1869 (advertisement).
Williams, W. W. History of Ashtabula County, Ohio. 1878. P. 19.
Owen, James. "'Skeleton of Giant' Is Internet Photo Hoax." National Geographic News, 14 Dec 2007.