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50 free Johnny Weissmuller trivia questions with answers — sports quiz, new questions added Aug 2026.
This Johnny Weissmuller trivia quiz covers both halves of an extraordinary life: the swimmer who never lost a race and the actor who became the definitive screen Tarzan. The easy questions cover the basics: the sport, the five golds, the ape man, Cheeta and Jane. Medium questions get into the polio that put him in the water, the coach who made him, the record he took from Duke Kahanamoku, the underwear contract MGM had to buy him out of, and how the famous yell was made. The hard questions are for film buffs and swimming historians: the vampire bat scene cut from Tarzan Escapes, why Boy had to be adopted, the Acapulco shoot of Tarzan and the Mermaids, the Jungle Jim films where he played 'Johnny Weissmuller', the Kellogg diet, the 1927 rescue of eleven people, his five marriages and the yell played three times at his graveside. Every answer was checked against encyclopaedia entries on Weissmuller, his co-stars and the individual films, and the supporting sentence is stored with each question. Our Tarzan quiz covers the whole franchise from Elmo Lincoln to Disney, and our Olympic and classic Hollywood quizzes make good follow-ups.
30 of 50 questions with answers and explanations. Play the quiz
Q 01How many Olympic gold medals did Weissmuller win in total?
Five
He added 52 US national titles and 67 world records and retired unbeaten.
Q 02At which two Olympic Games did Weissmuller win his swimming golds?
Paris 1924 and Amsterdam 1928
He won the 100 m freestyle and the 4 x 200 m relay at both Games, plus the 400 m freestyle in Paris.
Q 03Weissmuller's Olympic bronze medal came in which team sport?
Water polo
He won it in Paris in 1924 as a member of the US national team.
Q 04Weissmuller was born in 1904 in Szabadfalva, then part of which kingdom?
Hungary
His Banat Swabian family took him through Ellis Island in January 1905, when he was seven months old, and settled first in Windber, Pennsylvania.
Q 05Which disease, contracted at age nine, led a doctor to recommend that young Weissmuller take up swimming?
Polio
His first lessons were at Fullerton Beach on Lake Michigan in Chicago.
Q 06Weissmuller lied about his age at 11 to join which organisation and start racing?
The YMCA
The minimum age was 12; he won every race he entered.
Q 07Which Chicago coach, nicknamed 'the beloved tyrant', trained Weissmuller at the Illinois Athletic Club?
Bill Bachrach
He also coached the US Olympic swimming teams in 1924 and 1928.
Q 08Whose 100-metre freestyle world record did Weissmuller break in July 1922, swimming 58.6 seconds?
Duke Kahanamoku
Two years later he beat the Hawaiian for Olympic gold in the same event.
Q 09Weissmuller was the first man to swim 100 metres freestyle in under what time?
One minute
He was also the first under 5:00 for 440 yards.
Q 10Who took silver behind Weissmuller in the 1924 100 m freestyle, with his brother taking bronze?
Duke Kahanamoku
The Hawaiian surfing pioneer had won the event in 1912 and 1920.
Q 11Weissmuller's 1927 world record of 51.0 seconds for the 100-yard freestyle stood for how many years?
17
He swam 48.5 in 1940 aged 36, but as a professional it did not count.
Q 12Which Battle Creek health guru's vegetarian diet did Weissmuller adopt?
John Harvey Kellogg
He broke one of his own records after adopting the regime of nutrition, enemas and exercise.
Q 13In 1927 Weissmuller, working as a Chicago lifeguard, saved how many people after a boat accident?
11
He was training for the Chicago Marathon swim at the time.
Q 14Weissmuller's first screen role was as which mythological figure in Glorifying the American Girl (1929)?
Q 21What trick is used in the recorded Tarzan yell at its midpoint?
It is played in reverse
MGM once fibbed that it blended a hyena's howl, a camel's bleat, a violin pluck and a soprano's high C.
Q 22Which comedienne would perform the Tarzan yell on request during her TV show's weekly Q&A?
Carol Burnett
She once taught it to opera singer Beverly Sills.
Q 23What is the name of the chimpanzee sidekick in Weissmuller's Tarzan films?
Cheeta
The original animal, Jiggs, appeared in the first two films and died of pneumonia in 1938.
Adonis
He wore nothing but a fig leaf in the Ziegfeld Follies revue sequence.
Q 15When MGM wanted him for Tarzan, Weissmuller was under contract to model what?
BVD underwear
MGM freed him by lending Greta Garbo and Marie Dressler to the company's advertisements.
Q 16Which screenwriter spotted Weissmuller and set up his big break as Tarzan?
Cyril Hume
MGM had been searching for its ape man when they came across the decorated Olympian.
Q 17Who played Jane opposite Weissmuller in six Tarzan films from 1932 to 1942?
Maureen O'Sullivan
The Irish-born actress was later the mother of Mia Farrow.
Q 18What was Jane's surname in the Weissmuller films, as opposed to Porter in the novels?
Parker
In Tarzan the Ape Man her father James Parker is hunting for the elephants' graveyard and its ivory.
Q 19Why were the elephants in Weissmuller's Tarzan films fitted with fake ears and tusks?
Indian rather than African animals were used
Indian elephants have much smaller ears than their African cousins.
Q 20According to MGM's sound department, which recordist created the Tarzan yell by manipulating Weissmuller's voice?
Douglas Shearer
Weissmuller himself always insisted the yodel was entirely his own, learned at German beer halls and picnics.
Q 24The 1934 sequel to Tarzan the Ape Man scandalised censors with what scene?
A nude underwater swim
O'Sullivan's swimming double was Josephine McKim, who had competed at the 1928 Olympics with Weissmuller.
Q 25Which of Weissmuller's ape-man films was added to the US National Film Registry in 2003?
Tarzan and His Mate
It was directed by MGM's art director Cedric Gibbons.
Q 26A week-long sequence cut from Tarzan Escapes (1936) after test screenings showed Tarzan fighting what?
Vampire bats
Audiences found the scenes too intense.
Q 27Why was Boy adopted rather than born to Tarzan and Jane in Tarzan Finds a Son! (1939)?
The Production Code, since they were not clearly married
The baby survives a plane crash and turns out to be heir to the Greystoke fortune.
Q 28Which child actor, chosen by Weissmuller from over 300 hopefuls, played Boy in eight Tarzan films?
Johnny Sheffield
He later starred as Bomba the Jungle Boy in a dozen films of his own.
Q 29In Tarzan's New York Adventure (1942), why do Tarzan and Jane travel to Manhattan?
Boy has been kidnapped by a circus
It was the sixth and last MGM film and O'Sullivan's final outing as Jane.
Q 30Tarzan Triumphs (1943), the first RKO entry, pits Tarzan against whom?
Nazi Germans
The MGM-contracted Jane actress could not appear because the series had moved to RKO.