Louis Cyr (October 10, 1863 - November 10, 1912) was a French Canadian strongman with a career spanning the late 19th and early 20th centuries. His recorded feats, including lifting 500 pounds (227 kg) (1/4 ton) with one finger and backlifting 4,337 pounds.
While several of Cyr's feats of strength may have been exaggerated over the years, some were documented and remain impressive. These included:
lifting a platform on his back holding 18 men for a total of 4300 pounds.
lifting a 534-pound weight with one finger.
pushing a freight car up an incline.
At 19 years old, he lifted a rock from ground up to his shoulder, officially weighted at 514 pounds.
Perhaps his greatest feat occurred in 1895, when he was reported to have lifted 4,337 pounds ( on his back in Boston by putting 18 men on a platform and lifting them. One of his most memorable displays of strength occurred in Montreal on 12 October 1891. Louis resisted the pull of four draught horses (two in each hand) as grooms stood cracking their whips to get the horses to pull harder, a feat he again demonstrated in Ottawa with Queen Victoria's team of draught horses during her royal visit. While in Ottawa he volunteered with the police when they took deputies to round up a local gang of miscreants; they turned him away claiming he would be too slow due to his bulk. He challenged the regular officers to a foot race, beating the majority, and they took him on.
Cyr was born in Saint-Cyprien-de-Napierville, Quebec, Canada. Coming from a robust French-Acadian family, he began developing extraordinary strength at an early age. While Louis' father was of average proportions, his mother was almost Amazonian, recorded as weighing 265 pounds at 6'1". From the age of twelve Cyr worked in a lumber camp during the winters and on the family's farm the rest of the year. Discovering his exceptional strength at a very young age, he impressed his fellow workers with his feats of strength.
Louis started his strong man career at the age of 17, after some publicity came about due to an incident when the young Louis was reported to have lifted a farmer's heavily laden wagon out of the mire in which it had become stuck. He was matched in a contest against Michaud of Quebec, who was recognized as Canada's strongest man of the time. Cyr beat him in tests of lifting of heavy stones by hoisting a granite boulder weighing 480 lb.
In 1878 the Cyr family immigrated to Lowell, Massachusetts in the United States. In Lowell Cyr changed his name from Cyprien-Noé to Louis, as it was easier to pronounce in English. Again his great strength brought him fame. At 17 years old he weighed 230 pounds. He entered his first strongman contest in Boston at age 18, lifting a horse off the ground; the fully grown male horse was placed on a platform with 2 iron bars attached enabling Cyr to obtain a better grip. The horse weighed at least 3⁄4 short ton.
Title: John Robinson's $25,000 challenge feature. Louis Cyr. Strongest man on earth, lifts 4300 lbs. Engaged at a salary of $2000 per week
Date Created/Published: Buffalo : Courier Litho. Co., c1898.
Medium: 1 print (poster) : chromolithograph ; sheet 207 x 107 cm (poster format)
Summary: Circus poster showing Louis Cyr, full-length portrait, standing, facing front, holding bar.
Library of Congress: LC-DIG-ppmsca-55129