The Phillips DNA Project News

Charles Byrne was a giant of a man for his times, 7 feet 7 inches tall.  He left his home in Ireland when he was 19 and traveled to London to make his fortune as a freak.  Charles died in 1783 and his skeleton was preserved by a surgeon.  Researchers in Britain and Germany have now extracted DNA from his teeth and solved the mystery of his excessive height.  Click here to read the rest of the story in the The New York Times.