Reed College Students Might Have Made the World’s Biggest Stick of Chalk

The students aren't sure how the object will be moved out of the basement it was made in, as it likely weighs over 1,000 pounds.

Physics major Lorenzo Barrar ’19 gestures toward the enigmatic stick of triumph, which is estimated to weigh at least 1300 pounds. (Tom Humphrey)
By Elise Herron

A group of students at Reed College are on their way to the record books for creating what's likely the world's biggest stick of chalk.

The team of two dozen students started working on the behemoth project in January by rapidly filling a massive, cylindrical tube with water and plaster, Reed Magazine reports.

The results? A stick of chalk that stands just over 6-feet-tall and 24-inches wide. That beats the current Guinness World Record, set by Pittsburgh high schoolers in 2010, of 5-feet-11-inches tall and 23 and ⅝ inches around.

Last Friday, March 1, surveyors  traveled to Reed to official measure the super-sized stick of chalk.

(Tom Humphrey)

The measurements still need to be verified, but if they hold up the stick will take its place in the list of world records. The students took on the project as part of Paideia, Reed's "annual festival of learning."

Lorenzo Barrar, a physics major and one of the students who helped make the big chalk, says he's not sure how the stick will be moved out of the Reed basement it was made in, as it likely weighs over 1,000 pounds.

"We've talked about cutting it into pieces," Barrar told Reed Magazine. "We might also work it onto some car jacks, put it on a dolly, and get it into the elevator. Or possibly just try to lug it upstairs."

Read more about the endeavor, and how the chalky material was verified, here.

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