MONROE — An Edmonds man is waiting for Guinness World Records to decide if he has broken the record for the tallest structure built with Lincoln Logs.
On the final weekend of this year’s Evergreen State Fair, Paul Nickle built a 12-foot, 5-inch tower in the fair’s main exhibit hall.
The current record in this category is held by a group of people in Lincoln, Neb., who in April built a structure reaching 12 feet, 4-inches.
Nickle, 47, who works in quality control at Boeing, had his family’s help to construct the tower.
“Our Lincoln Logs tower got a first-place ribbon at the fair,” Nickle said. “So we decided to try to break the record. We beat the current record, got it measured, witnessed and photographed before it fell when the tape measure got too close. The sound of the logs falling drew a bigger crowd than the attempt itself.”
Guinness World Records receives more than 50,000 world-record applications a year, almost 1,000 each week, so it takes a lot of time to assess an attempt to break an existing record title, said Guinness spokeswoman Sara Wilcox.
Nickle has been working up to the world’s record attempt for about a decade, he said. He’s been collecting Lincoln Logs most of his life.
“My grandmother, who recently passed at the age of 103, would be so proud of my log collection, which she started for me,” Nickle said. “They are the old kind of Lincoln Logs, the rich, red-brown-colored logs, not the gray pressboard sold today.”
Lincoln Logs, notched miniature logs, were invented by John Lloyd Wright, son of the architect Frank Lloyd Wright.
“I think that the son of Frank Lloyd Wright would also appreciate the architecture of my design,” Nickle said. “When I was kid I wished I had more Lincoln Logs. Over the past 30 years I have acquired many sets, amounting to thousands of pieces.”
It could be months before Nickle knows if he is the new record holder, and in the meantime, someone else might submit a claim for the record, Wilcox said. The Lincoln Logs tower record category has had about five claims during the past five years.
Nickle is not discouraged.
“We plan to do it again next year at the Monroe fair,” he said.
Gale Fiege: 425-339-3427; gfiege@heraldnet.com.
To donate old Lincoln Logs to Paul Nickle’s collection and keep him in the running for the world’s tallest structure built with the toy logs, call him at 425-210-7738.
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