And here's the list of every winning word since 1925:
1925 gladiolus 1926 cerise 1927 luxuriance 1928 albumen 1929 asceticism 1930 fracas 1931 foulard 1932 knack 1933 torsion 1934 deteriorating 1935 intelligible 1936 interning 1937 promiscuous 1938 sanitarium 1939 canonical 1940 therapy 1941 initials 1942 sacrilegious 1946 semaphore 1947 chlorophyll 1948 psychiatry 1949 dulcimer 1950 meticulosity 1951 insouciant 1952 vignette 1953 soubrette 1954 transept 1955 crustaceology 1956 condominium 1957 schappe 1958 syllepsis 1959 catamaran 1960 eudaemonic 1961 smaragdine 1962 esquamulose 1963 equipage 1964 sycophant 1965 eczema 1966 ratoon 1967 Chihuahua 1968 abalone 1969 interlocutory 1970 croissant 1971 shalloon 1972 macerate 1973 vouchsafe 1974 hydrophyte 1975 incisor 1976 narcolepsy 1977 cambist 1978 deification 1979 maculature 1980 elucubrate 1981 sarcophagus 1982 psoriasis 1983 Purim 1984 luge 1985 milieu 1986 odontalgia 1987 staphylococci 1988 elegiacal 1989 spoliator 1990 fibranne 1991 antipyretic 1992 lyceum 1993 kamikaze 1994 antediluvian 1995 xanthosis 1996 vivisepulture 1997 euonym 1998 chiaroscurist 1999 logorrhea 2000 demarche 2001 succedaneum 2002 prospicience 2003 pococurante 2004 autochthonous 2005 appoggiatura 2006 Ursprache 2007 serrefine 2008 guerdon 2009 Laodicean 2010 stromuhr 2011 cymotrichous 2012 guetapens 2013 knaidel 2014 feuilleton, stichomythia 2015 scherenschnitte, nunatak 2016 Feldenkrais, gesellschaft
Jun 1, 2017
2016 — Feldenkrais, gesellschaft
Last year's spelling bee saw another tie after finalists exhausted the entire word list. The two winning words were "Feldenkrais," spelled by Jairam Hathwar of New York, and "gesellschaft," spelled by Nihar Sai Reddy Janga of Texas. "Feldenkrais" is a type of exercise therapy devised by Israeli engineer Moshe Feldenkrais. "Gesellschaft," in social theory, is a word for a society in which human relations are impersonal. Check out the entire list of winning words here.
2015 — scherenschnitte, nunatak
Two spellers were named co-champions in 2015 after the finalists exhausted the entire list of words. Vanya Shivashankar of Kansas correctly spelled "scherenschnitte" — the art of paper cutting — to earn her share of the title. Missouri's Gokul Venkatachalam clinched with an equally obscure word — "nunatak," a word of Greenlandic origin referring to a hill or mountain completely surrounded by glacial ice.
20011 — cymotrichous
Sukanya Roy of Pennsylvania won the 2011 spelling bee by correctly spelling "cymotrichous," a way to describe wavy hair.
2005 — appoggiatura
San Diego's Anurag Kashyap won the 2005 spelling bee by spelling "appoggiatura," a word for an embellishing musical note.
1998 — chiaroscurist
Jody-Anne Maxwell of Jamaica won the 1998 spelling bee, becoming the first non-American champion in the event's history. Maxwell clinched the championship by spelling "chiaroscurist," a painter who uses shadows and exaggerated light contrasts for artistic effect.
1987 — staphylococci
By the mid-1980s, the words used in the spelling bee finals became dramatically more difficult. Stephanie Petit of Pennsylvania won the 1987 bee by spelling "staphylococci," the plural form of a type of disease-causing bacteria.
1978 — deification
"Deification" was the winning word at the 1978 spelling bee, correctly spelled by Peg McCarthy of Kansas. "Deification" is the act of treating someone like a god.
1970 — croissant
Libby Childress of North Carolina aced the word "croissant" to win the 1970 title.
1967 — chihuahua
Jennifer Reinke of Nebraska clinched the 1967 title by correctly spelling "chihuahua." The dog breed shares its name with the Mexican state it originates from.
1960 — eudaemonic
Henry Feldman of Tennessee correctly spelled "eudaemonic" to win the 1960 spelling bee. "Eudaemonic" means "producing happiness."
1936 — eczema
Jean Trowbridge of Iowa correctly spelled "eczema" — a skin condition — to clinch the 1936 spelling bee. She also had to correctly spell "predilection," which another finalist had missed. Three decades later, "eczema" would resurface as the winning word at the 1965 bee.
1925 — gladiolus
The championship word from the inaugural National Spelling Bee in 1925 was "gladiolus," a flowering plant in the iris family. Eleven-year-old Frank Neuhauser of Kentucky correctly spelled it to take home the top prize — $500 in gold pieces and a trip to the White House. When he returned to Louisville, crowds greeted him with a ticker-tape parade and bouquets of aptly chosen gladiolus flowers, according to The Washington Post's obituary of Neuhauser, who died in 2011. The New York Times called Neuhauser's winning word "a cakewalk by modern standards" that "harks back to simpler times." In the above photo, sixth-place finisher Patrick Kelly poses with President Calvin Coolidge.