(12 Sep 2025)
RESTRICTION SUMMARY:
ASSOCIATED PRESS
Fort Wayne, Indiana – 11 September 2025
1. Medium of Alex Babich showing photographs showing photographs of the day he measured his sunflower for the Guinness World Records
2. Wide and tilt up of tall sunflowers supported by a structure
3. SOUNDBITE (English), Alex Babich, Guinness Record for the tallest sunflower:
“To grow the tallest sunflower and beat the Guinness World Record, it’s very emotional. It’s as it’s as good as it comes for an extreme grower, a giants grower. This is what we do. This is our hobby.”
4. Wide of a Babich walking toward a garden structure
5. Mid of a Babich climbing a ladder holding sunflower
6. Wide of a Babich waving from a tall structure holding the sunflower
7. SOUNDBITE (English), Alex Babich, Guinness Record for the tallest sunflower:
“My name is Alex Babich. A little bit of history about me. I was born and raised in Ukraine. We immigrated to the United States when I was 14, back in 1991. Back in (19) 86 Chernobyl happened. We lived 50 miles away from Chernobyl. It’s a nuclear power plant disaster. So we immigrated. It took us five years to get out. We emigrated to Fort Wayne and we stayed here ever since.”
8. Mid of Babich on a ladder tending to a towering sunflower
9. Wide of ladder leaning against a tall structure supporting sunflowers
10. SOUNDBITE (English), Alex Babich, Guinness Record for the tallest sunflower:
“Sunflower is a national flower of Ukraine, so it’s special to me. And seven year ago I planted our first sunflower. It was 13 feet tall, I remember. I was so impressed by it, and then the following year we grew a 15 foot sunflower, and the year after we grew 19 foot sunflower. So I was like, this is really cool, how far can we take this, you know, from there.”
11. Wide of a Babich climbing a tall structure supporting a sunflower
12. Mid of Babich showing photographs of blooming clover
13. SOUNDBITE (English), Alex Babich, Guinness Record for the tallest sunflower:
"I started the seed in a house in a cup. I started it the last week of April. And after about seven or eight days, I transplanted the young plant into the structure. That was on May 1st when I transplanted it. And today, you know, today is September 9th. So right now, our sunflower clover is 35 feet and nine inches. That’s the official measuring that we just took for Guinness. "
14. Mid of a sunflower-themed pillow at Babich’s backyard
15. Mid of a sunflower-themed sign with "hello" on a wooden wall at Babich’s home
16. SOUNDBITE (English), Alex Babich, Guinness Record for the tallest sunflower:
"It’s always been historically Germany and Netherlands that had it. So this is first time in history an American grower achieved this record. And the fact that I achieved it by five feet and eight inches, it’s kind of a big step to show the world we have really good growers here in America, too. So that’s really, I’m really proud of that.”
17. Medium of Babich taking photo of sister and nephew with the sunflower
18. Wide of Babich and family members observing his nephew climbing a ladder to see the towering sunflower plant
19. SOUNDBITE (English), Alex Babich, Guinness Record for the tallest sunflower:
"I’m doing this as a legacy for my family. I’m going to die someday, but the stories of this flower will live on, you know, so. My kids will be telling their stories to the grandkids and so forth. So it’s really cool. It’s really neat."
20. Wide and pan left to right of towering sunflower structure
21. Mid of Babich and his wife admiring the sunflower in their backyard garden
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