Amos Urban Shirk (1890? – October 20, 1956) was an American businessman, author and prodigious reader of encyclopedias. 1890 was a common year starting on Wednesday (see link for calendar). ... October 20 is the 293rd day of the year (294th in leap years) in the Gregorian Calendar, with 72 days remaining. ... 1956 (MCMLVI) was a leap year starting on Sunday of the Gregorian calendar. ... Bibliophilia is the love of books; a bibliophile is a lover of books. ... Brockhaus Konversations-Lexikon, 1902 An encyclopedia (alternatively encyclopaedia) is a written compendium of knowledge. ...

As a businessman he worked in the food industry. He wrote Marketing Through Food Brokers, published in 1939 by McGraw-Hill. He invented a synthetic chicle and introduced vitamin capsules to grocery stores. The McGraw-Hill Companies logo. ... Binomial name Manilkara chicle (Pittier) Gilly Chicle is the gum from Manilkara chicle, a species of sapodilla tree. ... A Vitamin is an organic molecule required by a living organism in minute amounts for proper health. ...

He was also renowned as a prodigious reader. Shirk read the entire 23-volume 1911 Encyclopædia Britannica from cover to cover in four and a half years, reading on average 3 hours per night, and taking two to six months per volume. As of 1938 he had begun reading the 14th edition, saying he found it a "big improvement" over the 11th, and saying that "most of the material had been completely rewritten". Supporters contend that the Eleventh Edition of the Encyclopædia Britannica (1910-1911) represents the sum of human knowledge at the beginning of the 20th century; indeed, it was advertised as such. ...

Shirk did not limit himself to Britannica. He also read Henry Smith Williams's 24-volume Historians' History of the World, which took him two years. Among his other feats of prodigious reading were an eighteen-volume set of Dumas (read twice), a thirty-two-volume set of Balzac (twice), and a twenty-volume set of Charles Dickens (three times). Alexandre Dumas, père, born Dumas Davy de la Pailleterie (July 24, 1802 – December 5, 1870), is best known for his numerous historical novels of high adventure which have made him the most widely read French author in the world. ... Honoré de Balzac Honoré de Balzac (May 20, 1799 – August 18, 1850) was a French novelist. ... Dickens was a prolific writer who was almost always working on a new installment for a story and rarely missed a deadline. ...

Shirk had other hobbies including painting and record collecting. The Mona Lisa is perhaps the best-known artistic painting in the Western world. ... Record collecting has been around probably nearly as long as recorded sound. ...

See also

• The Know-It-All: One Man's Humble Quest to Become the Smartest Person in the World

References

• "Reader", The New Yorker, March 3, 1938. pg.17