- Was the first man in the world to swim 100 m. freestyle in less than a minute.
- Won 5 Olympic Gold Medals 1924-1928 for swimming. Broke the record in each race. From 1921-1929 he won every free style race he entered.
- In 1974, he broke a hip and leg. While hospitalized he learned that, in spite of his strength and lifelong daily regimen of swimming and exercise, he had a serious heart condition.
- 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 began to clap and escorted the group back to a safe area, where Weissmuller was presented a $100 bill.
- Inducted into the U.S. Olympic Hall of Fame, 1983 (charter member).
- His stormy marriage to Lupe Velez received much coverage in the Hollywood scandal sheets. The makeup man on the "Tarzan" set reportedly had quite a time of it concealing bruises and bite and scratch marks on Weissmuller due to the pair's many fights. Johnny told his son he finally left Lupe after an argument in which she admitted to killing his dog; he killed her parrot in retaliation. The parrot, which Lupe acquired during her relationship with Gary Cooper, would call Weissmuller "Gary".
- At his request, a recording of his trademark Tarzan yell which he invented was played as his coffin was lowered into the ground.
- Moved to Las Vegas from Florida in 1973 where he was a greeter at the MGM Grand Hotel for a time.
- Johnny Weissmuller has one of the best competitive swimming records of the 20th century: He was one of the world's fastest swimmers in the 1920s, winning five Olympic gold medals for swimming and one bronze medal for water polo at the Olympic Games in 1924 (Paris) and 1928 (Amsterdam). He won fifty-two U.S. National Championships, set more than fifty world records, both in freestyle and backstroke, and was purportedly undefeated in official competition for the entirety of his competitive career.
- 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.
- His daughter, Heidi, died in a car crash on November 19, 1962. She had been driving south along the Pacific Coast Highway, on the way to return her husband and a friend to the naval base in San Diego where they were stationed. A few miles north of Laguna Beach, she fell asleep at the wheel and crashed. Heidi and her unborn child died. Her husband and his friend survived. According to his son, Weissmuller never got over the loss of his daughter and unborn grandchild.
- He was born in Freidorf (a district of Timisoara, Romania since 1950). His parents, Elisabetha (Kersch) and Petrus Weißmüller, were Banat Swabians (ethnic Germans), and citizens of Austria-Hungary. The family arrived in the United States on January 26, 1905 when Johnny was 7 months old.
- 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).
- His famous Tarzan call was an extended yodel perfected by him as a child.
- Swimmer/actor, won five Olympic gold medals
- During the making of the "Jungle Jim" movies, he was fined $5000 for every pound he was overweight.
- In the late 1950s after retiring from acting, Weissmuller moved back to Chicago and started a swimming pool company. He also lent his name to other business ventures, but did not have a great deal of success. He retired in 1965 and moved to Fort Lauderdale, Florida, where he was Founding Chairman of the International Swimming Hall of Fame.
- Appears on sleeve of The Beatles' "Sgt Pepper's Lonely Hearts Club Band".
- Brother of Pete Weissmuller. According to Johnny's son, Johnny (who was born in modern-day Romania) and Pete (who was born in Pennsylvania 8 months after Johnny and their parents immigrated to the United States) switched identities so that Johnny could compete at the U.S. Olympic trials, a plan hatched by their mother. For the rest of his life, Johnny feared that the Amateur Athletic Union, the governing body for competitive swimming at the time, would learn of the deception and strip him of his records and medals.
- In 1970, he attended the British Commonwealth Games in Jamaica where he was presented to Queen Elizabeth.
- He was the first speaking Tarzan and he died in January 1984, the month after the last surviving silent Tarzan, James Pierce, died.
- During his appearance on German television show "Das aktuelle Sportstudio", a monkey removed his wife Maria's wig and threw it on the floor (1971).
- Made a cameo appearance with former "Tarzan" co-star Maureen O'Sullivan in The Phynx (1970). It was the only film in which he actually said, "Me Tarzan; You Jane.".
- Had three children: Johnny Weissmuller Jr., Wendy Anne (b. June 1, 1942), and Heidi Elizabeth "Lisa" (July 30, 1943 - November 19, 1962).
- Inducted into the Body Building Guild Hall of Fame in 1976.
- After school, he worked as a bellhop and elevator operator at the Plaza Hotel in Chicago and trained for the Olympics with a swim coach at the Illinois Athletic Club, where he developed his revolutionary high-riding front crawl. He made his amateur debut on August 6, 1921, winning his first AAU race in the 50-yard freestyle.
- Biography in: "The Scribner Encyclopedia of American Lives". Volume One, 1981-1985, pages 858-859. New York: Charles Scribner's Sons, 1998.
- Born at 6:30pm-LMT
- Won swimming olympic medals in 1924 and 1928.
- Caricatured in Hollywood Steps Out (1941).
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