Thursday, April 2, 2009
1.Black and White Twins
A mixed-race British mom, Kylie Hodgson, gave birth in 2005 to twins, one of each — one black, the other white. The odds of such a birth are about a million to one, experts said. Although occurrences of this nature sometimes occur when a woman conceives twins fathered by two different men, this was a much rarer case in which a single pairing produced twins with distinctly different physical attributes (e.g., skin tone, hair color, eye color) rather than a blending of their parents' characteristics. The parents, Kylie and her partner, Remi Horder, are of mixed race themselves, both having been born to white mothers and black fathers. Their twin girls — Kian and Remee — were both born with blue eyes, with Remee having blonde hair and Kian having black hair and somewhat darker skin than her sister. Since then, Remee's skin tone has become lighter, while Kian's has become darker and her eyes have turned brown.
2.Twin Boys, twin lives
The stories of identical twins' nearly identical lives are often astonishing, but perhaps none more so than those of these identical twins born in Ohio. The twin boys were separated at birth, being adopted by different families. Unknown to each other, both families named the boys Jim. And here the coincidences just begun. Both James grew up not even knowing of the other, yet both sought law-enforcement training, both had abilities in mechanical drawing and carpentry, and each had married women named Linda. They both had sons whom one named James Alan and the other named James Allan. The twin brothers also divorced their wives and married other women - both named Betty. And they both owned dogs which they named Toy. Jim Lewis and Jim Springer finally met in February 9, 1979 after 39 years of being separated.
3.Twin Sisters, Twin boys delivered the same day
On 2004, twenty-one-year-old twins Ashlee Spinks and Andrea Springer both delivered twin boys by Caesarean section at Northside Hospital (Georgia, USA) at the same day.
The mothers – who did not use fertility drugs to conceive - were 6 months pregnant when they discovered they were both carrying twin boys and were both due on the very same day.
This “one in a million” coincidence is attributed mainly to the fact that not only do Ashlee and Andrea have an obvious history of twins in their family, but both their husbands’ families also have a history of twins.
4.World's Heaviest Twins: over 723 lb each
Billy Leon McCrary (1946 - 1979) and Benny Loyd McCrary (1946 - 2001), known together as the McGuire twins, were listed in the Guinness Book of World Records as the "World's Heaviest Twins", with 328 kg (723 lb) and 338 kg (745 lb), correspondingly).
Born in Hendersonville, North Carolina, the twins began using the stage name McGuire and gained popularity as tag-team wrestlers and in carnival stunt shows. Billy McCrary died on July 14, 1979 at the age of 32, following a motorcycle accident during a stunt at Niagara Falls. Benny lived for 21 more years, until his death at age 54 on March 26, 2001 of heart failure.
5.World’s Oldest Twins: over 100 years old
Kinsan Ginsan was the affectionate name give to twin sisters from Japan who were record-setting in terms of their longevity. Gin and Kin, whose names mean silver and gold in Japanese, were born on 1 August 1892 in Nagoya, 270km (170 miles) west of Tokyo. Kin was the elder daughter and Gin was the younger daughter. Tests proved that they were identical twins, although for some reason they had different blood types.
In 1991, they celebrated being about to reach 100 years of age, and were featured in a newspaper article in which the mayor of Nagoya met both of them and congratulated them. Their health and vitality, despite being over 100 years old, was said to be “an ideal form of living in your sunset years”, and they became national celebrities in Japan. Kin died in 2000 and Gin in the next year, at the age of 108.
6.Twins with the greatest height difference between each other
Hussain Bisad of London, England who is 7ft9, and his 5ft5 twin sister, Khardra, who lives in their homeland of Somalia, have a 28 inch difference in the height between them, holding the world record for the greatest height difference between twins. Hussain also holds the record for having the biggest hand span of any living man.
7.Twins separated at birth in Mexico, meet each other by chance in US
Twins separated at birth 20 years ago in Mexico had an unexpected reunion after one of the girls enrolled at a university in Long Island. Tamara Rabi had no idea Adriana Scott existed until students began confusing her with the other girl.
The girls were adopted by different sets of parents in the US. Tamara grew up with Jewish parents on the Upper West Side of Manhattan. Adriana was raised a Catholic in a Long Island suburb of the city. But each girl had no idea she had a twin until Tamara moved to Long Island last autumn.
People she had never met claimed to know her. Confusion gave way to astonishment when a friend told her that he knew someone so similar they had to be sisters. Her name was Adriana and she went to another university not far away on Long Island.
They first contacted each other through internet. It turned out they were both adopted and were exactly the same height, just over 5ft 3in. Finally, one e-mailed the other a picture. Their looks were so similar there was no longer any doubt. Since then, the girls have become close friends.
8.Twins born in different years
Catalin and Valentin from Romania are twins with different years of birth. Catalin was born in December (2 months premature). The doctors were able to wait and deliver her second son Valentin two months later in February. Romanian doctors attributed the time lag in the births to a rare congenital condition that gave the twins mother two uteruses due to a congenital malformation that occurred when she was herself an embryo in her mother’s womb. Approximately one in every 50,000 women has a double uterus but the hospital believes this was the first case where a woman had become pregnant at the same time in both wombs and given birth nearly two months apart. The two brothers were both healthy when they were released from the hospital on the same day.
9.Identical twins, suspects of the same crime for sharing DNA
$6.8 million worth of jewelry were snatched from the cases of Kaufhaus des Westens, a luxurious seven-story department store. Three masked, gloved thieves were caught on surveillance cameras sliding down ropes from the store's skylights, outsmarting its sophisticated security system.
That night they got away, but they did leave evidence: DNA, found in a drop of sweat on a latex glove discarded next to a rope ladder used to reach the ground floor. Police ran the material through the German crime database. And they got a hit — two in fact.
The computer identified 27-year-old Lebanese identical twins Hassan and Abbas O. Police arrested the brothers and charged both with burglary, an offense that carries a potential 10-year prison sentence. But later on, before the case went to trial, they were released.
Here's the thing: the authorities had no choice, as the court ruling made clear: "From the evidence we have, we can deduce that at least one of the brothers took part in the crime, but it has not been possible to determine which one." The German law doesn't allow to detain someone indefinitely just because he is suspected of a crime. Police will continue to keep an eye on them, hoping to be led to the loot. But with the brothers' arrest warrants suspended, they are free to travel, and the authorities cannot tap their phone lines or keep tabs on their bank accounts.
10.Twins brothers, different parents after test tube mix-up
Wilma and Willem Stuart were a Dutch couple who had been unsuccessfully trying to conceive for years and decided to try IVF. They soon learned they would be parents of twins. When the two boys were born, Koen had blue eyes, dark hair and pink skin, Tuen had dark eyes dark hair and brown skin. A DNA test revealed that Koen was the Stuarts child but Tuen was not Willem’s. The report of the investigation has not been made public, but speculation is that a piece of lab equipment called a pipette, like a large eyedropper, had been used twice, causing another man’s sperm to be mixed with Willem’s. The hospital called it a “deeply regrettable mistake”. The Stuarts remembered there was a black couple in the waiting room the same day during the IVF process. The hospital located the man and confirmed he was Tuen’s biological father. Although he was under no obligation to meet his son he never knew he had, he did when Koen was 18 months old. The biological father only looked at him from a distance and didn’t try to claim him and was comfortable that the Stuarts loved the child, and let them continue raising him.
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