The Guinness Book of Records is the biggest-selling copyrighted book of all time, according to Publisher, Young, with 92 million books sold since 1955. But when it was first imagined, it wasn't even going to be for sale.

The book was the brainchild of Sir Hugh Beaver, the managing director of the Guinness Brewery in Ireland. On November 10, 1951, he got into an argument while hunting with friends out in southeastern Ireland over which was the fastest game bird.

Sir Hugh Beaver thought that hundreds of other such things were apparently being discussed and a book of records could resolve these differences.

Joel Waul had created the humongous ball in his driveway using 300,000 bands of different colours and sizes. (Guinness World Records)

Edited September 6, 201213 yr by (._.)Milestone(._.)
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The largest known land gastropod is the African giant snail achatina achatina, the largest recorded specimen of which measured 39.3cm (15.5in) from snout to tail when fully extended, with a shell length of 27.3cm (10.75in) and weighed exactly 900g (2lb)

1,253 Smurfs gathered in the high street in the town of Castleblayney in County Monaghan, Ireland on July 18, 2008. (Guinness World Records)

The fastest 100m hurdles wearing swim fins is 19.278 seconds and was acheived by Veronica Torr (New Zealand) on the set of New Zealand Smashes Guinness World Records at the Mt Smart Stadium in Auckland.

Photograph: John Wright/Guinness World Records

The largest pocket knife was designed by Telmo Cadavez and hand made by Virgilio, Raul and Manuel Pires of Portugal.

The knife is 3.9m long when open and weighs 122kg.

The world's heaviest lemon weighed 5.265 kg (11 lb 9.7 oz) on January 8, 2003 and was grown by Aharon Shemoel (Israel) on his farm in Kefar Zeitim, Israel.

Scott Murphy recently set a Guinness World Record for The Tightest Circumference to Roll a 12 Inch Aluminum Frying Pan by Hand in 30 Seconds - 6.87 inches.

Scott Murphy accomplished this on July 30th, 2007 in Myrtle Beach, South Carolina.

In Germany, Anita Schwarz set a new record for carrying the most steins of lager over 40m.

She staggered across the finishing line holding 19 glasses.

Sam Wakeling holds the current Guinness World Record for unicycle distance in 24 hours: 281.85 miles (453.6km)

A man from Switzerland with 10,000 ‘Do Not Disturb’ hotel room door signs.