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Johnny Weissmuller

Johnny Weissmuller

Made a cameo appearance with former "Tarzan" co-star Maureen O'Sullivan in The Phynx (1970).

Moved to Las Vegas from Florida in 1973 where he was a greeter at the MGM Grand Hotel for a time.

Natives of the village Zitiste near the town of Zrenjanin, Banat region in Serbia (near border with Romania) started a campaign to build a monument in honor of him, claiming that he was born there.(spring 2007).

Swimmer/actor, won five Olympic gold medals

The first Tarzan was Elmo Lincoln, however Johnny Weissmuller was the first Tarzan to be associated with the now famous Tarzan yell.



Was the first man in the world to swim 100 m. Freestyle in less than a minute

Weissmuller had a close call in Cuba during the time of the Cuban Revolution. While playing golf, he and his friends found themselves suddenly surrounded by a group of Fidel Castro's soldiers intent on kidnapping them, or worse. Thinking fast, Weissmuller immediately gave his trademark Tarzan yell. The soldiers immediately recognized it and were so delighted to meet Tarzan that they escorted the group back to a safe area.

When Weissmuller was introduced to the first Cheetah in his Tarzan films in 1931 (he worked with 8 chimpanzees altogether), the chimp's trainer told him to show no fear or the animal would attack him. As Weissmuller, dressed in his Tarzan loincloth and hunting knife, walked up to the animal, it bared its teeth, growled at him and lunged as if to attack him. Weissmuller took the knife out of the sheath and held it in front of the chimp's nose, to make sure he saw and smelled it. He then slammed the animal on the side of the head with the knife handle. He put the knife back in its sheath and held out his hand to the chimp. It glared at him, bared his teeth again, then changed its mind, grinned at Weissmuller and jumped up and hugged him. Weissmuller never had any further problems with the chimp--although other cast and crew members did--and it followed him around like a puppy dog during all the pictures they worked together.

Won 5 Olympic Gold Medals 1924-28 for swimming. Broke the record in each race. From 1921-29 he won every free style race he entered.

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