Johnny Weissmuller Video | Olympic Competition Highlights

Johnny Weissmuller (born Janos Weißmüller; June 2, 1904 – January 20, 1984) was an Austrian-Hungarian-born American swimmer and actor best known for playing Tarzan in movies. Weissmuller was one of the world's best swimmers in the 1920s, winning five Olympic gold medals and one bronze medal. He won fifty-two US National Championships and set sixty-seven world records. After his swimming career, he became the sixth actor to portray Edgar Rice Burroughs's ape man Tarzan in films, a role he played in twelve motion pictures. Dozens of other actors have also played Tarzan, but Weissmuller... MORE

Johnny Weissmuller (born Janos Weißmüller; June 2, 1904 – January 20, 1984) was an Austrian-Hungarian-born American swimmer and actor best known for playing Tarzan in movies. Weissmuller was one of the world's best swimmers in the 1920s, winning five Olympic gold medals and one bronze medal. He won fifty-two US National Championships and set sixty-seven world records. After his swimming career, he became the sixth actor to portray Edgar Rice Burroughs's ape man Tarzan in films, a role he played in twelve motion pictures. Dozens of other actors have also played Tarzan, but Weissmuller is by far the best known. His character's distinctive, ululating Tarzan yell is still often used in films. Weissmüller was born to Peter Weissmüller, who was an ethnic German and his wife Elisabeth Kersch, both of them Banat Swabians, in the Szabadfalu (Freidorf) suburb of the city of Temesvár (Romanian: Timişoara) in the Kingdom of Hungary, in the Austria-Hungarian Empire (since 1918 in Romania). The ship's roster from his family's arrival at Ellis Island lists his birthplace as Párdány (Serbian: Pardanj, today Međa), village on territory of today's Serbia, not far from the Romanian border. According LESS