By New York Post (U.S.) | Created at 2025-03-20 16:22:25 | Updated at 2025-04-05 06:46:22
2 weeks ago
America’s tallest man — a 7-foot, 8-inch former Virginia law officer, actor and Harlem Globetrotter known as a “gentle giant” — has died at his family home North Carolina, officials said. He was 67.
George Bell, who had striking roles in “American Horror Story” and in AMC’s “Freakshow,” was a beloved former Norfolk Sheriff’s deputy known for his “kind and fun-loving personality,” former co-workers said Wednesday.
“We are saddened to learn of the passing of former deputy George Bell,” the Norfolk Sheriff’s Office told the local station wtkr.com.
“He was well known for many things, but for those who worked with him he will be remembered for his kind and fun-loving personality. Our heartfelt prayers and condolences go out to his friends and family during this difficult time.”
The cause and date of his death weren’t immediately clear Thursday.
Born in Portsmouth, Va. in 1957, Bell was first awarded the tallest-man title by Guinness World Records in 2007 before he was dethroned by Igor Vovkovinskiy, who was a fraction of an inch taller.
He then reclaimed the towering title when Vovkovinskiy died in 2021.
Bell said that he was born an average size, but first knew he was different by fourth grade, when he had a growth spirt and reached 5 feet. He was diagnosed with a form of giantism, in which an overabundance of hormones sparks massive growth.
He was 6 feet by middle school, and 7-foot-6 by high school graduation.
“People ask me that all the time. It was a great childhood. I was always a very outgoing guy,” he told the Las Vegas Review Journal in 2019. “They really adopted me as I was. My teachers … my neighbors and friends I grew up with, they accepted me as George. I never was teased.”
Bell played basketball at Morris Brown College and Biola University then briefly with the Harlem Globetrotters in the 1980s.
Last year, while teaching basketball at a local summer camp, Bell said kids are sometimes startled by his sky-high appearance at first.
“One of the biggest things are the stares, but once they get comfortable and familiar they all come up and shake my hand, give me a hug and ask me some questions,” said Bell. “We’re just here to have fun with the kids and teach them some skills.”
He began his performing career in 1984, when he played an alien who landed on top of the Los Angeles Memorial Coliseum during the closing ceremonies of the Olympics that year.
“I was scared,” he told the Vegas paper. “I was standing on the edge, leaning forward and I was, ‘Oh, my God.’ It was a unique experience.”
He would later get roles in critically acclaimed shows, such as “American Horror Story,” where he played a “tall ghost” who was held down on a bed by acting legend Jessica Lange.
“I was nervous because I didn’t want to grab her too tight and didn’t want to bruise her,” he told the paper in Vegas, where he briefly lived.
His acting career and notoriety as the nation’s tallest man brought him into contact with other tall celebrities, such as the massive, 6-foot-9 Icelandic strongman Hafthor Bjornsson — who is famous for playing “The Mountain” in HBO’s “Game of Thrones” and who Bell has been pictured towering over.
Later on, the big-hearted Bell also spoke at Virginia schools about bullying, telling the Danville Register and Bee last year, “The main thing is to tell the kids how to handle it, how to deal with it, because the kids have no idea.”
Bell was a “valued member” of the Norfolk Sheriff’s Office from December 2000 t o May 2014, the department said.
