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Eddie Carmel
עודד הכרמלי
Born
Oded Ha-Carmeili

(1936-03-16)March 16, 1936
Tel Aviv, Israel
DiedAugust 14, 1972(1972-08-14) (aged 36)
Montefiore Hospital in the Bronx, New York
Other names"The Jewish Giant", "The Happy Giant," "The World's Tallest Cowboy"
Alma materBaruch School of Business, City College of New York
Occupation(s)carnival sideshow act, screen actor
Years active1958–69

Eddie Carmel, born Oded Ha-Carmeili (Hebrew: עודד הכרמלי) (March 16, 1936 – August 14, 1972) was an Israeli-born American entertainer with gigantism and subsequent acromegaly resulting from a pituitary adenoma. He was popularly known as "The Jewish Giant", "The Happy Giant," and "The World's Biggest Cowboy." Carmel was billed at heights of up to 9 feet (2.7 m), though he may have more realistically been around 7 feet 3 inches (2.21 m). He was variously a mutual funds salesman, carnival sideshow act, screen actor, singer, and stand-up comedian. He was made famous by a 1970 Diane Arbus photograph which appeared in Time, Newsweek, and Life magazines.

Agenda

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Unused references listed here to show up in {{reflist}}. [1] [2] [3] [4] [5] [6] [7] [8] [9] [10] [11] [12] [13] [14] [15] [16] [17] [18] [19] [20] [21] [22] [23] [24] [25] [26] [27] [28] [29] [30] [31] [32] [33] [34] [35] [36] [37] [38] [39] [40] [41]

Agenda is

  1. classify reliability of references: do they mention only in passing, do they repeat blarney, do they cite Wikipedia
  2. fill in incomplete references (page numbers, date, accessible URLs); remove unusable Google-books links
  3. from reliable sources, reference as much as possible and note any remaining unreferenced assertions
  4. see if remaining references might fill in the gaps; then judge whether to delete assertion, find a better source, or add "some sources say" hedge
  5. what to do where statement is sourced to unavailable online?
  6. reread reliable sources for any extra information worth adding
    • Gay Talese and Arbus in 1961
    • The mutant [in THE HEAD THAT WOULDN'T DIE] was played by 7'8" Eddie Carmel, who had been "Eleazer Carmel, the wrestling champion of Israel" and "The Happy Giant Clown" on TV(!)
  7. copyedit for flow
  8. expunge any unused sources
  9. copy to article space, uncommenting infobox photo and transcluding Categories

Additions:

  • Provenance of various museum prints, and destination of noted auctioned prints.
  • Comments from Arbus on Carmel's personality, and her earlier acquaintance with him, and the context of her attachment to "freaks".
  • More films etc -- jumpoff from IMDB but only cite better refs
  • cite for comedian career
  • his 1971 impromptu poem on Arbus -- how does that TV appearance square with his retirement/incapacity?

Childhood and education

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External image
image icon Photograph of Eddie Carmel as a normal-sized boy in January 1941

Oded Ha-Carmeili was born in Tel Aviv, Mandatory Palestine (now Israel), the only child of Orthodox Jewish parents, Itzhak Ha-Oded Ha-Carmeili from Poland and Miriam (née Pines) from the United States. When he was two years old, the family relocated to the Bronx in New York City so his mother could care for an ailing relative. His father worked as an insurance salesman and his mother as a secretary at the Jewish Theological Seminary. In America his father became Isaac Carmeli and young Oded began to go by "Eddie"; "Carmel" came later as a stage name.

Height progression of Eddie Carmel[15]
Year Age Height
ft in cm
1949 13 5 10 178
1951 15 6 4 193
1953 17 6 8 203
1964 28 7 81⁄4 234

Carmel was of normal size until adolescence; his his parents were 5 feet 6 inches (1.68 m) and 5 feet 5 inches (1.65 m). At 15 years of age he was diagnosed with gigantism and acromegaly; he had radiotherapy to treat a pituitary tumor over the next two years, but continued to grow until a final treatment in 1964 when he was 28. His later self-mythology included a birth weight of 16 pounds (7.3 kg), a height aged seven of 6 feet 1 inch (1.85 m), and ancestry including Goliath of Gath and a Polish maternal great-grandfather in Warsaw was the world's tallest rabbi at 7 feet 6 inches (2.29 m). Carmel was billed at the exaggerated heights of up to 9 feet 1⁄2 inch (2.756 m).[42] A 1965 edition of the Guinness Book of Records claimed he was the world's tallest man at 8 feet 9.5 inches (2.680 m);[43] the 1988 edition estimated his height from photographs at 7 feet 6 inches (2.29 m).[42] He had a shoe size[n 1] of 24, sometimes exaggerated to 35.

Carmel graduated from Taft High School in 1954, and for the next two years attended Baruch School of Business, which was then part of City College of New York, where he was elected vice president of his class and joined the Dramatic Club. He dropped out to pursue an entertainment career exploiting his size.

Career

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In 1958, Carmel was selling mutual funds at an office near Times Square in Manhattan. He tried to break into stand-up comedy, attending clubs and forming a double act with friend Irwin Sherman, with public stunts such as protesting the small size of the Volkswagen Beetle. Due to his condition, Carmel's primary work was in carnival sideshows. At Hubert's Dime Museum and Flea Circus on West 42nd Street in Times Square, he was "Texas Ed Carmel, the World's Tallest Cowboy".[44][45] He toured with the sideshow attached to the World of Mirth carnival, while Milt Levine was barker, and later toured with Ringling Bros. and Barnum & Bailey Circus, which billed his size as 9 feet 5⁄8 inch (2.76 meters) and 500 pounds (230 kg). When not on tour he lived with his parents on Elgar Place in Co-op City in the Bronx.

Carmel had bit parts playing monsters on television and in a few films, including The Brain That Wouldn't Die (1962) and 50,000 B.C. (Before Clothing) (1963). His deep basso profondo secured some dubbing work, and he studied French, German, and Spanish to increase his range. He formed a band, Frankenstein and the Brain Surgeons, and recorded novelty songs "The Happy Giant", "The Good Monster," and "The Happy Monster's Song". When his mobility declined he restricted his circus work to Madison Square Garden, and stopped altogether in 1969 when arthritis made it difficult to mount the stage; he used two canes and later a wheelchair. Promoters of some later public appearances, such as supermarket openings, refused to pay him because he was unable to stand, and his seated height was less impressive.

Carmel, who always wanted to "play Carnegie Hall", was among the "random collection" of guest stars there on 5 January 1972 in A Marvel-ous Evening with Stan Lee, in which he recited a poem about "my kid brother the Hulk".[46]

Arbus photograph

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Carmel was made famous by Diane Arbus' photograph Jewish Giant, taken at Home with His Parents in the Bronx, N.Y. It was taken on 10 April 1970, ten years after Arbus first met and photographed Carmel at Hubert's. In the famous image, Carmel's back is arched against the low ceiling of the apartment as he looks away from the camera at his parents gazing up at him. The other shots in the same reel are more conventional family portraits with Carmel behind and between his parents as they all look at the lens.[47] Carmel quipped to Arbus, "Isn't it awful to have midget parents?" Arbus later wrote, "You know how every mother has nightmares when she’s pregnant that her baby will be born a monster? … I think I got that in the mother's face". Susan Sontag commented, "the parents look like midgets, as wrong-sized as the enormous son".[48]

The picture was first published in Artforum in May 1971, and was seen more widely in the 31 May 1971 issue of New York magazine.[49] Arbus included the photograph in A Box of Ten Photographs, her only portfolio, of which she had printed eight copies and sold four of a planned limited edition of 50 by the time of her July 1971 suicide. The four unsold sets were posthumously redesignated artist's proofs, and the edition was completed in 1973 with 46 sets printed by Neil Selkirk.[40] Some sets of A Box of Ten Photographs have been split, with individual prints sold separately. Christies sold the print of Jewish Giant from Selkirk set number 34 for $56,250[n 2] in 2013.[50]

Original prints of the photograph sold for $340,000[n 3] in 2004,[51] $220,000[n 4] in 2005,[51] $421,000[n 5] at Christie's on 18 October 2007,[52][51] and $583,500[n 6] at Christie's on 17 May 2017 (inscribed to Nancy Grossman and Anita Siegel).[53] A print from the estate of Arbus' manager Marvin Israel sold for "only $4,950" in November 1984, the subject matter being "too doom and gloom" for the market's mood.[54]

Original prints outside the Box of Ten edition exist. Nancy Grossman's was of the same dimensions as the box set; Philip Leider's copy was 14.875 by 14.675 inches (377.8 mm × 372.7 mm);[55] another by Arbus of 14.25 by 12.875 inches (361.9 mm × 327.0 mm) sold at Christie's in 1991;[56] another 15.375 by 15.125 inches (390.5 mm × 384.2 mm) sold in 1993 and 2005;[57] another 13.625 by 12 inches (346.1 mm × 304.8 mm) in 2007.[58] One by Selkirk of 9.75 by 9.625 inches (247.7 mm × 244.5 mm) sold at Christie's 5 October 2015[59]

Individual prints:

Jewish Giant was also included in Twelve Photographs, 1961–1971, an edition of 1000 published for Venezia 79 la fotografia [it] with profits to UNESCO.[61]

The picture has been reproduced in many photography books, beginning in 1973 with Anne Wilkes Tucker's The Woman's Eye and Volker Kahmen's Art History of Photography.[62]

Los Angeles 2001 essay by Bernard Cooper.[63]

Death and legacy

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On August 14, 1972, Carmel died of a heart attack at age 36, in Montefiore Hospital in the Bronx, New York. At the time of his death, he had shrunk several inches, due to kyphoscoliosis (curvature of the spine, a mixture of scoliosis and kyphosis). His parents sold his clothes to a sideshow collector and soon moved back to Israel.

Jenny Carchman, upon learning that her father was a first cousin of the "giant" in Arbus' photograph, made an audio documentary about Carmel, which premiered in 1999 at Manhattan's Jewish Museum, was later broadcast on All Things Considered, and reported by Laurie Dhue for Special Edition on MSNBC. In 2014 the Jewish Museum mounted an "intimate 'essay' exhibition" centered on its print of Arbus' photograph and augmented with Carmel's belongings and memorabilia.

In the 2006 Arbus biopic Fur, the giant based on Carmel was played by former Maccabi Tel Aviv basketball player Eric Gingold.[64] Jerome Charyn's 2015 short story "Dee" is based on Arbus' photographing of Carmel.[65]

Notes

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  1. ^ U.S. adult men's sizing
  2. ^ equivalent to $69,919 in 2023
  3. ^ equivalent to $513,873 in 2023
  4. ^ equivalent to $332,506 in 2023
  5. ^ equivalent to $618,629 in 2023
  6. ^ equivalent to $725,295 in 2023

References

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  1. ^ Acton, David (2004). Photography at the Worcester Art Museum: Keeping Shadows. Worcester Art Museum. ISBN 978-0-936042-10-7.
  2. ^ Berger, Phil (2000-11-14). The Last Laugh: The World of Stand-Up Comics. Cooper Square Press. ISBN 978-1-4617-3199-3.
  3. ^ Bernard, George (1977). Inside the National enquirer : confessions of an undercover reporter. Port Washington, N.Y.: Ashley. pp. 53–56, 64. ISBN 978-0-87949-089-8.
  4. ^ "Sure to Be Big In Disk Trade". Billboard Music Week. Chicago: Nielsen Business Media: 40. 5 May 1962.
  5. ^ Bosworth, Patricia (1985). Diane Arbus : a biography. London: Heinemann. pp. 193–194, 246, 311. ISBN 978-0-434-08150-9.
  6. ^ Carchman, Jenny (October 6, 1999). "The Jewish Giant". All Things Considered. StoryCorps.
  7. ^ Charyn, Jerome (2015). "Dee". Bitter Bronx: Thirteen Stories. Liverlight. pp. 141–152. ISBN 9780871404893.
  8. ^ Jerome Charyn: 2015 National Book Festival. Washington, D.C.: Library of Congress. September 5, 2015. transcript of interview. Retrieved 11 February 2022.
  9. ^ Dean, Michelle (2016-06-20). "'Diane Arbus' examines a photographer who specialized in human mystery". Christian Science Monitor. ISSN 0882-7729. Retrieved 2020-06-26.
  10. ^ Drimmer, Frederick (1985). Very special people : the struggles, loves, and triumphs of human oddities. New York: Bell. p. xix. ISBN 978-0-517-46798-5. In December, 1971, a group of human oddities had a round-table discussion on Channel Thirteen in New York City. Among them were the giant Eddie Carmel, a 712-pounder named Big Jim, an albino named Sandra Reed, and Dolly Regan, described as half-woman, half-child.
  11. ^ "Death Takes Gentle Giant at 36". The Record. Hackensack, New Jersey. August 1, 1972. p. 31. Retrieved 2020-06-26 – via Newspapers.com.
  12. ^ Hartzman, Marc (2006). American Sideshow. Penguin. ISBN 978-1-4406-4991-2.
  13. ^ Heinlein, Sabine (May 23, 2014). "The Jewish Museum Trivializes the Jewish Giant". Tablet Magazine.
  14. ^ Heller, Jules; Heller, Nancy G. (2013-12-19). North American Women Artists of the Twentieth Century: A Biographical Dictionary. Routledge. ISBN 978-1-135-63889-4.
  15. ^ a b de Herder, Wouter W. (5 November 2021). "The possibilities and impossibilities of treating acromegaly 50 years ago illustrated by Diane Arbus, A Jewish Giant at Home with his Parents, 1970". Endocrinology, Diabetes & Metabolism Case Reports. 2021: 21–0131. doi:10.1530/EDM-21-0131. ISSN 2052-0573. PMC 8686176.
  16. ^
  17. ^ Lubow, Arthur (April 9, 2014). "The Woman and the Giant (No Fable)". The New York Times.
  18. ^ Lubow, Arthur (2016). Diane Arbus : portrait of a photographer. New York: Ecco. pp. 252, 517, 519, 528, 652, 698. ISBN 978-0-06-223432-2.
  19. ^ McHarry, Charles (April 4, 1961). "On the Town; The Gentle Giant". Daily News. p. 47 – via newspapers.com.
  20. ^ Morris, Daniel (2009). "The Backwards Man and the Jewish Giant; Mirrors of Traumatic Memory in the Later Photographs of Diane Arbus". In Jacobs, Steven L.; Garber, Zev (eds.). Maven in Blue Jeans: A Festschrift in Honor of Zev Garber. Purdue University Press. pp. 125–134. ISBN 978-1-55753-521-4.
  21. ^ Palmer, Daniel S. (28 June 2014). "Masterpieces & Curiosities: Diane Arbus's Jewish Giant". The Jewish Museum New York. Archived from the original on 28 July 2014. {{cite web}}: |archive-date= / |archive-url= timestamp mismatch; 28 June 2014 suggested (help)
  22. ^ Raphael, Jordan (2003). Stan Lee and the rise and fall of the American comic book. Chicago: Chicago Review Press. p. 133. ISBN 978-1-55652-506-3.
  23. ^ Rodes, David (September 24, 2014). "Lunchtime Art Talk Recap: David Rodes on Diane Arbus". Hammer Museum.
  24. ^ Sayej, Nadja (2018-04-09). "Diane Arbus' daring early work: 'It was a story that went untold, until now'". The Guardian. ISSN 0261-3077. Retrieved 2020-06-26.
  25. ^ Schultz, William Todd (2011). An Emergency in Slow Motion: The Inner Life of Diane Arbus. Bloomsbury Publishing USA. ISBN 9781608196814 – via Google Books.
  26. ^ San Francisco Museum of Modern Art (2003). Diane Arbus : revelations. New York: Random House. pp. 57, 66–67, 153, 190, 208, 209, 223, 300–1, 314, 325, 338, 341, 343. ISBN 978-0-375-50620-8. Chapters:
    • The question of belief / Sandra S. Phillips p. 50
    • A chronology / Elisabeth Sussman and Doon Arbus p. 121
    • In the darkroom / Neil Selkirk p. 267
    • Afterword / Doon Arbus p.299
    • Biographies / Jeff L. Rosenheim p.306
  27. ^ Sloan, Mark (1990). "EDDIE CARMEL—THE JEWISH GIANT (1964)". Hoaxes, humbugs, and spectacles : astonishing photographs of smelt wrestlers, human projectiles, giant hailstones, contortionists, elephant impersonators, and much, much more!. New York: Villard Books. p. 35. ISBN 978-0-394-58511-6. Eddie claimed to be 9 feet, 5/8 inch (weight 535 pounds), but his actual height was 7 feet, 7 inches.
  28. ^ Solomon, Zachary (June 17, 2014). "The Jewish Giant at the Freak Show".
  29. ^ Stewart, David (April 23, 2001). "Isay's people: survivors holding on with dignity". Current.
  30. ^ Sugrue, Francis (May 6, 1963). "The Happy Giant". The Daily Times. p. 6 – via newspapers.com.
  31. ^ Talese, Gay (1961). New York: a Serendipiter's Journey. photgraphs by Marvin Lichtner. Harper. pp. 73–75.
  32. ^ Vogel, Carol (2007-12-18). "A Big Gift for the Met: The Arbus Archives". The New York Times. ISSN 0362-4331. Retrieved 2020-06-26.
  33. ^ Waldman, Amy (23 September 1999). "Revisiting a Life Dwarfed by Size; A Poignant Radio Homage To the 'Jewish Giant'". The New York Times. p. E1. Retrieved 12 February 2022.
  34. ^ Wender, Jessie (April 8, 2014). "The Subject of an Arbus". The New Yorker. Retrieved 2020-06-26.
  35. ^ Christie's, Lot 25B (17 May 2017). "Diane Arbus, A Jewish Giant at Home". www.christies.com. Retrieved 2020-06-27.{{cite web}}: CS1 maint: numeric names: authors list (link)
  36. ^ "DIANE ARBUS (1923–1971); A box of ten photographs". Live Auction 16736: The Yamakawa Collection of Twentieth Century Photographs. Christies. 6 April 2018. Retrieved 14 February 2022.
  37. ^ "Diane Arbus: Photographer of Flaws". Legacy.com. March 14, 2011. Retrieved 26 June 2020.
  38. ^ "MSNBC Special Edition 20:00 hour anchored by Ann Curry". Getty Images. Retrieved 12 February 2022.
  39. ^ "Eddie Carmel, 500‐Pound Giant At Ringling Circus, Dies at 36". The New York Times. July 31, 1972.
  40. ^ a b c "Lot 91: Diane Arbus 'A Jewish giant at home with his parents in the Bronx, N.Y.'". Photographs; 7 April 2021. Sotheby's. Retrieved 14 February 2022.
  41. ^ "Show Business; Circuses". Time: 53. 18 May 1962. Ac- cording to Eagle, Carmel would be 18 inches taller than he looks if he could straighten up; he is billed at straightened- up height (8 ft. 91⁄4 in.) anyway.
  42. ^ a b "Giants; Exaggerated heights". Guinness book of records 1988 (33rd ed.). Enfield: Guinness Superlatives. 1987. p. 7. ISBN 978-0-85112-868-9.
  43. ^ cited in Fuller, John G. (27 November 1965). "Trade Winds". Saturday Review. 48 (48). Omni Publications International. On the contemporary scene, the claimant is Eddie Carmel, billed at 8 feet, 91⁄2 inches
  44. ^ Gibson, Gregory (1 April 2008). Hubert's Freaks. Harcourt. p. 29. ISBN 978-0-15-101233-6. Eddie Carmel, the Jewish Giant, was the World's Tallest Cowboy during his Hubert's gigs.
  45. ^ "Biggest Man In Show Business Lands Some Of Smallest Parts" (PDF). Rhode Island Herald. Vol. XLIV, no. 48. February 3, 1961. p. 8. Retrieved 14 February 2022.
  46. ^
  47. ^ SFMOMA 2003 p. 209
  48. ^
  49. ^ "The Arbus Perspective". New York. 4 (22): 45. 31 May 1971.
  50. ^ "Lot 308: Diane Arbus (1923-1971); A Jewish giant at the home of his parents, Bronx, from 'A Box of Ten', 1967". Live auction 2732: Photographs. christies. 3 October 2013. Retrieved 15 February 2022.
  51. ^ a b c "Arbus, Diane". Benezit Dictionary of Artists. 25 July 2013. doi:10.1093/benz/9780199773787.article.B2235701.
  52. ^ "Live Auction 1893; Lot 415". www.christies.com. Retrieved 17 February 2022.
  53. ^ "Live Auction 14187: Post-War and Contemporary Art Evening Sale; Lot 25 B". Christies. Retrieved 17 February 2022.
  54. ^ Hogrefe, Jeffrey (6 November 1984). "Photo Finish". Washington Post. Retrieved 17 February 2022.
  55. ^ "'eddie carmel, a jewish giant with his parents in the living room of | Barnebys". Barnebys.com. Retrieved 18 February 2022.
  56. ^ "DIANE ARBUS (1923-1971) | Barnebys". Barnebys.com. Retrieved 18 February 2022.
  57. ^ barnebys 2005
  58. ^ "A Jewish Giant at home with his parents, 1967 | Barnebys". Barnebys.com. Retrieved 18 February 2022.
  59. ^ "A Jewish giant at home with his parents in the Bronx, N.Y., 1970 | Barnebys". Barnebys.com. Retrieved 18 February 2022.
  60. ^ Vogel, Carol (20 February 2004). "Inside Art". The New York Times. p. E32. Retrieved 14 February 2022.
  61. ^ "Lot 2072: DIANE ARBUS Jewish Giant 1970". Andrew Smith Gallery Photography Auctions, LLC February 6, 2021. invaluable.com. Retrieved 14 February 2022.
  62. ^ Parry, Pamela Jeffcott (1979). Photography index : a guide to reproductions. Westport, Conn: Greenwood Press. p. 33. ISBN 978-0-313-20700-6.
  63. ^ Cooper, Bernard (May 2001). "Retinal Detachment". Los Angeles Magazine. 46 (5). Emmis Communications: 130–134. ISSN 1522-9149.
  64. ^
  65. ^ Lopate, Phillip (September 24, 2015). "The Shadows Know". The New York Review of Books. LXII (14): 59.

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Category:People with acromegaly Category:People with gigantism Category:American people of Polish-Jewish descent Category:Israeli people of Polish-Jewish descent Category:1936 births Category:1972 deaths Category:Israeli emigrants to the United States Category:Israeli Jews Category:People from Tel Aviv Category:People from the Bronx Category:People from Co-op City, Bronx Category:City College of New York alumni Category:Baruch College alumni Category:Sideshow performers Category:American male film actors Category:Israeli male film actors Category:20th-century American male actors Category:20th-century Israeli male actors Category:Vaudeville performers Category:Ringling Bros. and Barnum & Bailey Circus people Category:American male comedians Category:Israeli male comedians Category:American stand-up comedians Category:Israeli stand-up comedians

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