# Who is the fattest person to live to 100+ years? **URL:** \ **Category:** Factual Questions\ **Created:** [September 30, 2019, 11:40pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/who-is-the-fattest-person-to-live-to-100-years/841067 "2019-09-30T23:40:04Z")\ **Posts on this page:** 16\ **Page:** 2
**Author:** ![EinsteinsHund](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/einsteinshund/32/8400_2.png) [@EinsteinsHund](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/EinsteinsHund)\ **Post date:** [October 2, 2019, 7:12pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/who-is-the-fattest-person-to-live-to-100-years/841067/21 "2019-10-02T19:12:49Z")
> [@Broomstick](#): > > \ > It’s the story of a lot of people born in Germany around the same time as Kissinger. Like, say, Albert Einstein. [Einstein is a special case](https://www.quora.com/Was-Albert-Einstein-German#targetText=Einstein%20thus%20left%20Germany%20before,a%20Swiss%20citizen%20in%201901.). He actively revoked his German citizenship long before the Nazis’ rise to power and became a Suisse citizen. Later, of course he became a US citizen (I don’t know if he kept his Suisse citizenship). ---
**Author:** ![Surreal](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/eada6e/32.png) [@Surreal](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Surreal)\ **Post date:** [October 2, 2019, 7:27pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/who-is-the-fattest-person-to-live-to-100-years/841067/22 "2019-10-02T19:27:39Z")
> [@Little\_Nemo](#): > > Masazo Nonaka. Cite? I saw some reports that he enjoyed watching sumo wrestling on TV, but none that he was an actual sumo wrestler. ---
**Author:** ![Broomstick](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/broomstick/32/246_2.png) [@Broomstick](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Broomstick)\ **Post date:** [October 2, 2019, 7:55pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/who-is-the-fattest-person-to-live-to-100-years/841067/23 "2019-10-02T19:55:18Z")
> [@EinsteinsHund](#): > > [Einstein is a special case](https://www.quora.com/Was-Albert-Einstein-German#targetText=Einstein%20thus%20left%20Germany%20before,a%20Swiss%20citizen%20in%201901.). He actively revoked his German citizenship long before the Nazis’ rise to power and became a Suisse citizen. Later, of course he became a US citizen (I don’t know if he kept his Suisse citizenship). Yes, but when have you ever heard anyone refer to Einstein as someone Swiss? And it’s by no means limited to either Einstein or Kissinger but if I mention my friend Jadwiga you’ll like just say “who?” because you never heard of her. Trust me, though, in the US you are what your ancestors were, and you can be a fully accepted citizen AND still referred as “that person from X”. ---
**Author:** ![Mahaloth](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/mahaloth/32/1079_2.png) [@Mahaloth](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Mahaloth)\ **Post date:** [January 1, 2020, 5:46pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/who-is-the-fattest-person-to-live-to-100-years/841067/24 "2020-01-01T17:46:09Z")
I just saw that Ed Asner is 90 years old and he is also pretty heavy(kind of always has been). I have yet to see an overweight 100 year old, though… ---
**Author:** ![Bijou\_Drains](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/bijou_drains/32/2814_2.png) [@Bijou\_Drains](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Bijou_Drains)\ **Post date:** [January 1, 2020, 6:02pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/who-is-the-fattest-person-to-live-to-100-years/841067/25 "2020-01-01T18:02:55Z")
> [@Oglomott](#): > > The character actor Leon Askin was a pretty big guy, and he lived to be 97. For those that don’t know the name he is most well known for playing General Burkhalter on Hogan’s Heroes. ---
**Author:** ![Schnitte](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/schnitte/32/9033_2.png) [@Schnitte](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Schnitte)\ **Post date:** [January 1, 2020, 7:12pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/who-is-the-fattest-person-to-live-to-100-years/841067/26 "2020-01-01T19:12:22Z")
> [@RivkahChaya](#): > > Kissinger isn’t German, he’s Jewish. Being born in Germany doesn’t make a person German, and that’s German law. Anyway, Kissinger is currently a US citizen. It is correct that German law follows the _jus sanguinis_ rather than _jus soli_ principle, which means you need German parents, rather than birth on German territory, to obtain German citizenship by birth. But Kissinger’s parents _were_ Germans (actually a family established in Germany for many generations), so he was born a German citizen. Of Jewish faith, yes, but a German by nationality nonetheless. The two were not mutually exclusive at that time; they were made mutually exclusive by the Nazis in 1935, when Kissinger was 12 years old. Kissinger could have reclaimed German citizenship after the War, when the 1935 racial laws were repealed, but chose not to do so, so as of now, he is (only) an American citizen. But saying that he was born Jewish rather than German is utter nonsense. ---
**Author:** ![DrDeth](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/d/b487fb/32.png) [@DrDeth](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/DrDeth)\ **Post date:** [January 1, 2020, 7:38pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/who-is-the-fattest-person-to-live-to-100-years/841067/27 "2020-01-01T19:38:47Z")
> [@Schnitte](#): > > It is correct that German law follows the _jus sanguinis_ rather than _jus soli_ principle, which means you need German parents, rather than birth on German territory, to obtain German citizenship by birth. But Kissinger’s parents _were_ Germans (actually a family established in Germany for many generations), so he was born a German citizen. Of Jewish faith, yes, but a German by nationality nonetheless. … Isn’t this getting a bit off topic? ---
**Author:** ![Hari\_Seldon](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/hari_seldon/32/5173_2.png) [@Hari\_Seldon](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Hari_Seldon)\ **Post date:** [January 2, 2020, 4:57pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/who-is-the-fattest-person-to-live-to-100-years/841067/28 "2020-01-02T16:57:23Z")
> [@EinsteinsHund](#): > > [Einstein is a special case](https://www.quora.com/Was-Albert-Einstein-German#targetText=Einstein%20thus%20left%20Germany%20before,a%20Swiss%20citizen%20in%201901.). He actively revoked his German citizenship long before the Nazis’ rise to power and became a Suisse citizen. Later, of course he became a US citizen (I don’t know if he kept his Suisse citizenship). I know that Einstein was a naturalized Swiss citizen. I saw his naturalization certificate. It is on display in a small Einstein museum in Bern where he lived while working at the patent office. But that doesn’t answer the question about Kissinger. He might or might not have been German; it depends only on whether his father was. Which depends only on whether his paternal grandfather was, which depends only on… It makes me wonder where German citizenship originated. Was it simply bestowed on all residents when Germany was put together? I understand that Germany didn’t have any naturalization process until recent years. ---
**Author:** ![Schnitte](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/schnitte/32/9033_2.png) [@Schnitte](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Schnitte)\ **Post date:** [January 2, 2020, 5:16pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/who-is-the-fattest-person-to-live-to-100-years/841067/29 "2020-01-02T17:16:14Z")
> [@DrDeth](#): > > Isn’t this getting a bit off topic? Admittedly. But I think a statement that claims that being German and being Jewish are mutually exclusive should not stand uncontradicted. ---
**Author:** ![Schnitte](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/schnitte/32/9033_2.png) [@Schnitte](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Schnitte)\ **Post date:** [January 2, 2020, 5:27pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/who-is-the-fattest-person-to-live-to-100-years/841067/30 "2020-01-02T17:27:41Z")
> [@Hari\_Seldon](#): > > I know that Einstein was a naturalized Swiss citizen. I saw his naturalization certificate. It is on display in a small Einstein museum in Bern where he lived while working at the patent office. But that doesn’t answer the question about Kissinger. He might or might not have been German; it depends only on whether his father was. Which depends only on whether his paternal grandfather was, which depends only on… It makes me wonder where German citizenship originated. Was it simply bestowed on all residents when Germany was put together? The Bismarck Empire that was put together in 1871 indeed linked German citizenship to the citizenship of its component states: You were a German citizen if you had the citizenship of any of its individual states, and these states remained in charge of adopting their own laws on the matter. It was kind of European Union citizenship today. It wasn’t until 1913 that imperial (i.e., federal) legislation harmonising citizenship for all of Germany was adopted, and even then the concept of state citizenship remained in place; the law harmonised the processes for acquiring state citizenship but did not unify all these state citizenships into one (it also created the new category of direct German citizenship whereby you could be a citizen of the Reich without being a citizen of a state; but the was meant mostly for the Germans in the colonies, while the vast majority of those living in Germany proper retained their citizenship of whatever state they were from). It was during Nazi rule that legislation did away with all these state-based citizenships and merged them into one citizenship for all of Germany. That conceptual change was not undone when present-day democratic Germany was set up in 1949, so now there exists only German citizenship, not separate citizenship in the states; but the racial criteria from the Nazi rule which deprived Jews of German citizenship were, of course, revoked. Coincidentally, just a few days ago I stumbled across my paternal grandfather’s naturalisation certificate from the 1920s, when he - a native Bavarian - was granted citizenship in Württemberg, a neighbouring German state. > [@](#): > > I understand that Germany didn’t have any naturalization process until recent years. That is not true. The process of getting naturalised might have been more cumbersome in the past than it is now, but as a notion of turning an alien into a citizen, the idea of naturalisation has long existed in German law. ---
**Author:** ![Chronos](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/chronos/32/134_2.png) [@Chronos](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Chronos)\ **Post date:** [January 2, 2020, 10:42pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/who-is-the-fattest-person-to-live-to-100-years/841067/31 "2020-01-02T22:42:26Z")
[Moderating] How the heck did we get from obesity and lifespan to German citizenship laws? If you want to discuss that, start a new thread for it. ---
**Author:** ![Sam\_Stone](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/ecccb3/32.png) [@Sam\_Stone](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Sam_Stone)\ **Post date:** [January 3, 2020, 3:34am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/who-is-the-fattest-person-to-live-to-100-years/841067/32 "2020-01-03T03:34:34Z")
Ernest Borgnine was not massive, but he was pretty fat and he lived to be 95. When an interviewer asked him about his secret to longevity, he said, “I masturbate every day.” So there you go. If you’re old and fat, start spanking the monkey. ---
**Author:** ![atimnie](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/atimnie/32/11_2.png) [@atimnie](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/atimnie)\ **Post date:** [January 3, 2020, 4:59am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/who-is-the-fattest-person-to-live-to-100-years/841067/33 "2020-01-03T04:59:27Z")
Guess I’ll live forever then. ---
**Author:** ![bump](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/b/7c8e57/32.png) [@bump](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/bump)\ **Post date:** [January 3, 2020, 3:50pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/who-is-the-fattest-person-to-live-to-100-years/841067/34 "2020-01-03T15:50:24Z")
> [@RivkahChaya](#): > > Kissinger isn’t German, he’s Jewish. Being born in Germany doesn’t make a person German, and that’s German law. Anyway, Kissinger is currently a US citizen. > > He also does not look obese to me in that picture. He looks seriously stooped-- practically humpbacked, and like he’s trying to hide it with a coat that is too large. I know a guy who had normal posture until he was 70 or so, then started to become bent over. By the time he died, at like 96, he was L-shaped. Surprisingly, he could walk pretty swiftly, and without a cane, but couldn’t stand up straight. Surgery could have brought him up to about 165 degrees (if perfectly upright is 180, and his current posture was 90), but he had a heart condition, and couldn’t find anyone to do what was essentially elective surgery on him. > > If this had happened after Botox was invented, that could have helped him a little, but it wouldn’t have repaired his blown discs. Googling pictures of “Henry Kissinger 2019”, he looks pretty hunched AND overweight, if you ask me. ---
**Author:** ![TruCelt](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/trucelt/32/523_2.png) [@TruCelt](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/TruCelt)\ **Post date:** [January 3, 2020, 5:35pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/who-is-the-fattest-person-to-live-to-100-years/841067/35 "2020-01-03T17:35:35Z")
Mr. Kissinger looks to me like he has lost some weight, but is still quite obese. Compare to [this slightly older phot](https://bostonglobe-prod.cdn.arcpublishing.com/resizer/bPfpJf9U6dKjzb4nit2JEAmX-6U=/1440x0/arc-anglerfish-arc2-prod-bostonglobe.s3.amazonaws.com/public/PJ464ORTUYI6TFNJLW3TBXICZM.jpg)o. ---
**Author:** ![Chessic\_Sense](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/c/7c8e57/32.png) [@Chessic\_Sense](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Chessic_Sense)\ **Post date:** [January 5, 2020, 4:44pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/who-is-the-fattest-person-to-live-to-100-years/841067/36 "2020-01-05T16:44:28Z")
Is their score determined by their weight at its lifetime peak, on their 100th birthday, or upon their death? I assume option 2. [Previous page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/who-is-the-fattest-person-to-live-to-100-years/841067.md?page=1)