41 years ago, on January 27th 1984, Klaus Friedrich set a world record by toppling 281,581 dominoes in Fuerth, West Germany. Because so little is known about Klaus and his record, this tends to be an overlooked piece of domino history. In fact, this picture, which appeared in newspapers, is the only known photo of the set-up that Klaus created.

This particular record actually is important because it was the catalyst for the Guinness Book making a significant rule change. This world record was not accepted by Guinness because the dominoes that Klaus used “were not true dominoes, but hollow plastic”. Up until then, all previous world records used traditional wooden dominoes, so Klaus was the first person to break that “rule” and Guinness wouldn’t accept his claim.

Despite initially rejecting his record, Klaus’s uncertified topple was noted in a short 3-line paragraph in the 1985 Guinness Book, but Englishman Michael Cairney still was listed as holding the solo record. However, by the time the 1986 edition was published, the folks at Guinness changed their ruling and certified Klaus’s topple of 281,581 hollow plastic dominoes as the new solo world record. So, thanks to Klaus and that rule change by Guinness, plastic dominoes eventually became the standard in the toppling world.

And we have some breaking news to share. While doing research about Klaus’s record, we happened to find a YouTube video of a German TV show called Wetton Dass from December 12th of 1981. It that video, Klaus toppled a chain of 22,222 dominoes, over 2 years before he did his world record. Now we finally know what Klaus looked like back when he was about 19 and if you watch this topple, you’ll see a bit of domino history. Klaus was the first person to create what is now known as a circle-bomb, where a single line falls into the middle of a large circle and then a wave of dominoes fans outward all around from the center.

So, let’s give Klaus Friedrich his due for inventing the circle-bomb, setting a solo record that stood for over 15 years, and getting the Guinness Book to accept plastic dominoes. Klaus, if you’re out there, we’d love to hear from you and maybe you’d like to join our Domino Dream Team and be part of another world record in the coming years.

We’ll catch you all again on the next ‘This Day in Domino History’. Follow us to stay up to date or visit us at Domino World Record dot com for the latest on world record domino news. We are growing our Domino Dream Team of artists right now!

– Erez and John