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Baltimore beards take their place in the Guinness Book of Records

November 27th, 2015 8:06 AM

By Jackie Keogh

Sharon Rose McKeever with the official certificate which she has received from the Guinness World Records

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Official recognition of Baltimore’s ‘Guinness World Record’ arrived this week – almost one year after the initial application was submitted. 

OFFICIAL recognition of Baltimore’s ‘Guinness World Record’ arrived this week – almost one year after the initial application was submitted. 

Now, officially, Baltimore has secured the record for the longest chain of artificial beards – a feat that was achieved on Sunday, May 3rd last.

Sharon Rose McKeever explained that the application was submitted in January and the Guinness World Records office took 12 weeks before they gave them the nod for the event that formed part of their ongoing ‘Happy in Baltimore’ project.

The first ‘Happy’ project was, of course, the video of everyone in the village bopping to the famous song by Pharrell Williams, but that was last year.

 This year the ‘Happy’ project involved skill sharing and getting everyone knitting and crocheting in a fun and interactive way.

Beards were just a random choice, but it gave Sharon and the rest of the knitters an idea and the Guinness Book of Records sprang to mind.

‘At first,’ Sharon said, ‘we wanted to have the record for the largest amount of people wearing artificial beards, but that record existed in America, where 18,000 Santa Clauses, with artificial beards, had already gathered.

‘So, it was back to the drawing board, and we finally came upon the idea of having the longest chain of artificial beards. The rules were very strict: the beards had to cover the face from ear to ear, cover the chin, and have a mouth hole.’ Sharon came up with a pattern that met all this criteria – the only problem was that she had just five days in which to reach the target. 

Always ready for a challenge, Sharon applied herself to the task at hand and knitted 508 beards in five days – just in time for ‘Happy Beard Day’.

Now, the only thing left to do is to sew all these beards together to make blankets for the local hospital. 

If anyone is interested in helping out please email Sharon: [email protected].

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