In the 1920s, a man could achieve nationwide fame simply by climbing a tall pole and refusing to come down. Alvin “Shipwreck” Kelly transformed this bizarre act into a lucrative and heavily publicized career, drawing massive crowds and creating a national fad.
Yet, despite his soaring heights and immense popularity, the man who spent over 20,000 hours sitting in the sky eventually died penniless and forgotten on the streets of Manhattan.
A Life Above the Ground
Born Aloysius Anthony Kelly in Hell’s Kitchen, Manhattan, he ran away to sea at age thirteen and adopted the name Alvin. Before becoming famous, he worked as a steelworker, steeplejack, high diver, and pilot.
He claimed to have popularized the pole-sitting fad in 1924 after either taking a dare or performing a publicity stunt for a Philadelphia department store. Sitting on elevated perches for days at a time quickly became his entire career.
Record-Breaking Stunts and Massive Crowds
At the height of his fame, Kelly toured twenty-eight cities and charged admission to spectators who wanted to watch him from nearby roofs. In 1930, he set a world record by sitting on a 225-foot flagpole atop the Steel Pier in Atlantic City for an astonishing forty-nine days and one hour.
He survived his stunts largely on coffee and cigarettes. To sleep without falling, he placed his thumbs in holes drilled into the pole shafts; the pain of swaying would force him upright without waking him. In another extreme stunt, he even sat on the iron crossbar of a speeding biplane flying 500 feet in the air.
The Decline of a Human Fly
Following the Wall Street crash of 1929, public tolerance for frivolous stunts plummeted, and Kelly’s career rapidly declined. By 1934, he was working as a gigolo in a Broadway dance hall.
When he attempted to break his Atlantic City record in the Bronx in 1935, police threatened to cut down the pole and arrested him as a public nuisance after less than a day. One of his final public stunts occurred in 1939 when he sat on a pole atop a Manhattan building, stood on his head, and ate thirteen donuts to celebrate National Donut Dunking Week.
A Tragic Return to Earth
Kelly’s final pole-sitting attempt took place in Texas in October 1952, but he suffered two heart attacks and was forced down after just one week. He retired immediately. One week later, on October 11, 1952, Kelly was struck and killed by a car while walking in Manhattan near his birthplace.
He was fifty-nine years old, entirely penniless, and his body initially went unclaimed at the morgue. When police searched his room, they found his duffel bag packed with ropes and climbing gear, ready for his next job. Under his arm when he died was a scrapbook of his life, which he had titled “The Luckiest Fool on Earth.”