Sword swallower come to Friday Harbor

Published 1:30 am Saturday, August 6, 2016

Internationally renown sword swallower Brad Byers will be performing at the San Juan County Fair. Byers is a multiple Guinness World Record holder and has appeared on numerous TV shows including America’s got Talent, Late Night with David Letterman, and Ripley’s Believe It or Not.

Byers will be performing throughout the fair in Aug. 17-20 on the community stage, and main stage.

According to his website Byers began performing after high school when he joined the traveling circus. After leaving the circus he began pursuing TV and movies. He considered sword swallowing to improve his act and borrowed his friend’s college anatomy book to learn about the esophagus. After researching, he finally found the appropriate sword at a local Army Navy store, and swallowed his first sword in the middle of the store. His act has since added several different stunts, including hammering nails into his nose, power drilling into his nose, and putting an 18 inch hook into his nose and swinging an anchor from it.

Byers has appeared in five episodes of the Fox TV show Guinness World Records Prime Time and was featured on Late Night with David Letterman. Byers has appeared on the Peruvian TV show Que Noche every night for a week and performed a different act each night. Brad’s work has taken him to over 20 countries for countless television shows and other venues. Due to his worldwide reputation, the country of Grenada has even pictured him swallowing swords on their official postage stamp.

From the circus to hit TV shows NBC’s America’s Got Talent and the History Channel’s Stan Lee’s Superhuman, Byers has done it all. For the premier episode of NBC’s America’s Got Talent Season four. Byers debuted his hook and anchor stunt, and The show’s judges commented, “Wildly entertaining!” and “Enjoyed every second of it!”

For more information go to bradbyers.com.