"Meet Clem Reinkemeyer, the owner of the world's largest brick collection, which has now won a Guinness World Record. He's been laying the groundwork of his huge stash for 40 years, collecting a whopping 8,882 bricks from all across the US and beyond," the BBC reports.



"Clem's daughter and her husband surprised him by applying for a world record in secret. They got a group of friends together to count the bricks while he was away, and then after applying, presented him with the certificate, much to his delight."

"The largest collection of bricks is 8,882, achieved Clem Reinkemeyer (USA) in Tulsa, Oklahoma, USA, on 29 April 2023," the Guinness World Records says.

"Clem has collected bricks for the past 40+ years."

"For most of his life, 87-year-old Clem has been collecting a strange collection of bricks from all over the world. He set up a special storage room for the collection and stored the various pieces there," the RBC-Ukraine reports.

"While her father was away, his daughter Celia and her husband Dan Bissett, who helped build Clem his special brick barn, gathered friends and decided to count the number of exhibits.

"His collection includes bricks from almost all American states, Germany, Greece, Ireland, and New Zealand. The oldest piece in the collection is over 1,000 years old - a Roman brick that was made in 100 AD."

"Reinkemeyer's collection, which he has been amassing for 40 years, includes a Roman brick from A.D. 100, but most date from the last few hundred years," the UPI reports.

"The break tide for making the bricks was about maybe 1870 to 1910," he said. "A special kind of brick like this has a certain clay that withstands heat, and everybody needed a fireplace."

"He said some of his most valuable bricks are those with misspellings, such as one that reads "Tulsa" with a backward "s."

"One of his favorite pieces is a sidewalk brick made at a Washington facility where the Pentagon now stands," the Samaa News reports.

"There may be some of these under the Pentagon," he mused. "But I think this is one of a kind." Reinkemeyer’s fascination with bricks lies in the history they represent.

""What appealed to me about bricks is, they have names and you can trace them back historically to places, and that always intrigued me. It's unusual, but I like it," he said.

World's First Brick-Paved Road, world record in Charleston, West Virginia

World's tallest surviving masonry structure, world record in Anaconda, Montana

World’s Largest Brick Made of Bricks: world record in Montgomery, Alabama

World’s Longest Yellow Brick Road: world record in Sedan, Kansas