Elmo Lincoln

He was the first Tarzan. A former Arkansas peace officer, Elmo Linkenhelt worked in D. W. Griffith's "The Battle of Elderbush Gulch" (1912). In a fight scene his shirt was partially torn off, displaying his powerful chest. Griffith noticed, called him over, and told him "That's quite a chest you have there". Griffith changed the name to Elmo Lincoln and featured him in several of his films. He got the role in "Tarzan of the Apes" when, a few days after production began, World War I broke out an the man originally contracted to play Tarzan (Stellan Windrow), a Naval Reserve officer, was recalled to active duty. The film was a box office smash, one of the first to earn over a million dollars. It's sequel, "Romance of Tarzan" just broke even.

It is mistakenly thought that Lincoln's performance as Tarzan in Tarzan of the Apes (1918) was the first time the character ever appeared on screen. Technically, this is wrong. The first actor to play Tarzan in a movie was Gordon Griffith, who appears in the film playing the character as a child before Lincoln appears on screen.

He did three successful serials and a feature for Universal Film Manufacturing before returning in "The Adventures of Tarzan" in 1921, his last Apeman performance.

His final silent performance was in a cheap Rayart serial "King of the Jungle" (1927) after which he moved to Mexico and invested in mining. He came back to play a number of bit parts and appeared briefly in the Seal Brothers Circus as "The Original Tarzan in Person".