Marple Friends & Neighbors magazine, February 2021

Page 20

People In Places

Marple Newtown High School Teacher Robert Speca: Inspiring a New Generation of Domino Topplers Written by Holly Stupak Robert Speca on the set of The Late Show with David Letterman

M

arple Newtown High School teacher Robert Speca is not your typical science teacher. He also happens to be a professional domino toppler, known as the “Domino Wizard,” the “Domino King,” and the “Father of Domino Toppling.” For the past 40+ years, he has been toppling all over the world, and appearing on such shows as The Tonight Show with Johnny Carson and The Late Show with David Letterman. He is listed in The Guinness Book of World Records as holding the record five times. Toppling is the art of standing up dominoes in sequence, to create a chain reaction also known as “the domino effect.” Only the first domino should be toppled by hand. Robert started domino toppling back when he himself was a student at MNHS in the 1970s. He became inspired when his 10th-grade math teacher, Mr. Dobransky, lectured his class on math induction theory and compared the theory to a row of falling

Photo courtesy of Mark Monroe

dominoes. After the lecture, Robert bought himself four boxes of dominoes, set them up on his dining room table and pushed the first one over. Since then, he has been hooked. Robert said watching the dominoes fall one by one was hypnotic and his fascination is something he can’t explain. “I started buying more boxes of dominoes and setting up shows in my basement,” he said. “I got carried away!” His domino displays for neighbors and friends caught the attention of a family friend who featured him in the local paper, The County Leader. Shortly after that, he got the opportunity to be on The Tonight Show with Johnny Carson, where

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