Tall tales: Members of local Tall Club celebrate their statures

Thursday, Aug. 23, 2001 | 9:02 a.m.

With a recent happy hour in full swing, an exuberant Brian Comeno, president of the Tall Club of Las Vegas, announced to the group seated before him that its most recent "prospect" measured in at 5 feet 10 inches tall.

A polite round of applause ensued and congratulations were in the air.

Should Susan Barker, the newcomer whose height was measured against a wall at the Blue Ox Tavern on West Sahara Avenue, formally accept membership in the social club for the tall, she will find herself with plenty of new friends and plenty of things to do.

There is happy hour on Thursdays, dancing on Tuesdays, occasional weekend camping trips and parties for nearly every holiday, no matter its origin.

There are well-wishers during times of sickness, group dinners at restaurants around town, occasional trips to Mexico and evenings at the theater.

The good times seem endless for those who are above average height.

"This is just a social club where we enjoy doing things together," said member Barbara Platt, who stands 5 feet 11 inches. "Usually in Las Vegas, you (move) here without family. This is family."

To become a member of the Tall Club, however, you must first measure up literally. Women must be no shorter than 5 feet 10 inches tall. Men must be no shorter than 6 feet 2 inches.

"Every three months, we have a prospect party," Comeno said recently during happy hour at the Blue Ox Tavern, where the group has met weekly for nearly two years. "We pull out a tape measure, throw 'em up against the wall to make it official."

Those who don't measure up are sent off with a warm goodbye. Those who qualify are welcomed into their new, tall family, where they stand among others of seemingly equal height. It's a refreshing change for some who are used to towering over others.

Nationally, the average height for women over age 20 is 5 feet 3 inches; for men it's 5 feet 8 inches, according to the National Center for Health Statistics, a federal agency that monitors the nation's health and collects data.

Tall club members are easily inches above these averages.

"When I first started coming to the tall club it just made me feel really good to be around people who were taller than me," said Dixie Shield, club secretary for five years, who is 5 feet 10 inches tall.

During her school years, Shield says she was always the tallest in her class. In her sophomore year of high school she grew five inches and reached her current height.

"I grew so fast that I constantly (slouched down)," Shield said, pulling her shoulders forward to demonstrate. Being 5 feet 10 inches in high school, she said, "was just too tall.

"But you outgrow that. The older you get, you just go with the flow."

And, eventually, you realize that there are others who share similar statures.

Tall Clubs International, the umbrella organization for tall clubs around the world, boasts 65 member clubs (under which the Tall Club of Las Vegas is included) in the United States and Canada. Individual memberships number 4,000, and there are 55 affiliated clubs in Europe.

Groups network and travel to other tall-club gatherings, sometimes overseas, to connect with other "talls," as the members call themselves. Some groups have catchy names, such as the Atlanta Sky-Hi Club, the Boston Beanstalks, the Portland Skyliners and the Skyscraper Club of Cleveland.

Growing together

Tall Club International lists its tallest male member as being 7 feet 3 inches and its tallest female at 6 feet 9 inches.

Clubs have been drawing new members since 1938 when Southern California resident Kae Sumner, a 6-foot-3-inch woman, wrote an article for the Los Angeles Times (under the pen name Kae Krysler) about the perks and problems of living in a world as a person who was well above average height.

Sumner added a note to the article encouraging other tall people to contact her and discuss their stories about being tall.

Eight tall people responded and the first meeting was held at Sumner's home. Shortly after, the group established itself as the California Tip Toppers Club and soon had the attention of tall people worldwide.

By 1948 there were 14 clubs in the United States and one in Canada. The year prior, the first Tall Club Convention was held in Los Angeles. Today tall-club conventions are held annually, and a Miss Tall International is selected each year.

College scholarships are offered to tall teens through the Tall Club International Foundation. Pen pal programs and Tallrific Teens clubs are offered to help exceptionally tall boys and girls, ages 10-18, bond with other tall teens.

Tall Club International requires that men be at least 6 feet 2 inches and women be at least 5 feet 10 inches to join. Further requirements are determined by individual clubs, and members of the Tall Club of Las Vegas say that some clubs bump up their height requirements.

Compared to tall clubs throughout the country, local members say that they're, well, a little short.

Some members in California tall clubs are as tall as 6 feet 10 inches, Platt said.

Shield said that when she previously lived in Oregon, she was actually not tall enough to be involved with a club there. Women were required by the group to be at least 6 feet tall, she said.

Also, Jane Jost -- who is 6 feet 2 inches and whose husband is 6 feet 5 inches -- said that a club she belonged to in Orange County, Calif., also required women to be 6 feet tall to join.

Jost, a Realtor, first joined a tall club after a fellow Realtor sent a note telling her about an upcoming costume dance an Orange County club was having.

Looking back, Jost recalls the event as "almost a claustrophobic experience" because it was the first time she'd been in a crowd where she wasn't overlooking a sea of heads.

Tall for all

"Initially being tall is the only thing we have in common," Jost said, referring to her fellow club members. But soon the group has its own commonness and eventually, "(We) never talk about height."

"What's fun is everybody's so different," Platt added.

Unlike some tall clubs, which focus on bringing tall singles together, the 15-year-old Tall Club of Las Vegas (founded by Carolyn Jacobs) includes both married couples and singles.

"This used to be a singles club," Platt said. "But everybody was getting married (to others in the group) so we changed our bylaws."

The group has several married couples. In fact, it was at a 1993 social for the Tall Club of Las Vegas that Platt met her husband, Blaine. The two were married seven years later.

But not all couples are equally tall, and the group doesn't discriminate against the not-quite-tall-enough spouses and significant others. For these shorter members by association (all three of them), there is the Down To Earth Club, which tags along at all the events, including a recent lobster run to Mexico and a "Survivor" party inspired by the CBS television show.

The Down To Earthers includes Sharon Daniels, a self-described "proxy member," who was once involved with a Tall Club of Las Vegas member who moved to Canada, leaving her behind. Although she only stands 5 feet 5 inches, club members kept her on board.

She will participate in the group's upcoming party Sept. 7-9 at the New Frontier. The party, which is expected to draw members from tall clubs nationwide, will feature a formal dance, pool party and sightseeing around Las Vegas.

The local tall club also raises funds for Sandy Allen, who has been authenticated since 1976 by the Guiness Book of World Records as the World's Tallest Woman.

Allen, who is in her 40s, lives in Indiana and is 7 feet 7 1/4 inches tall. Because of her extreme tallness -- the result of a tumor in her pituitary gland when she was younger -- Allen has health problems.

She shares her life story on her video "It's OK To Be Different" (which can be ordered via her website at members.aol.com/giantess/).

Being different is something to which members of tall clubs can relate.

Platt said that when people of her generation were growing up, "It wasn't fashionable to be tall," but sports and modeling have made it a little easier for tall women today.

"When I first came to the club," she said, "it was just nice to be around people my own size. It really is nice to be around tall people and ask, 'Are your pants long enough?' "

archive