Tarzan!

TCM is showing Tarzan movies today.  I thought I should pay homage to the first screen Tarzan, Elmo Lincoln.  The silent classic, Tarzan of the Apes, was made in 1918.  Please don't buy it if it was colorized!

Elmo was born in 1889 and on IMDb is credited with 80 movies from 1913 to 1952, the year he died.  I hadn't looked into his past before, and I was surprised.  He had small parts in Birth of a Nation in 1915, and The Hunchback of Notre Dame in 1923 with Lon Chaney.

After his last silent film, King of the Jungle in 1927 when an actor was mauled on the set, Lincoln took a step back from movies.  He started in bit roles in 1939 but never became popular again.  He was in another Tarzan movie in 1942, Tarzan's New York Adventure with Johnny Weissmuller in the title role, and he also worked in The Hunchback of Notre Dame in 1939 with Charles Laughton.  His last film was Carrie in 1952 with Sir Lawrence Olivier and Jennifer Jones.

Tarzan of the Apes also starred Enid Markey as Jane.  Curiously, she worked in silents until 1923 making 61 of them, then took a break starting again in talkies in 1945.  Maybe I have discovered the Curse of Tarzan the Silent Ape Man!

Enid worked in TV in her later years and appeared on "The Andy Griffith Show" and "Gomer Pyle, USMC" among others.  Her last film was in 1968, The Boston Strangler with Tony Curtis.