LOS ANGELES (AP) — Ron Ely, the tall, musclebound actor who played the title character in the 1960s NBC series “Tarzan,” has died at age 86.
Ely’s daughter, Kirsten Casale Ely, told The Associated Press on Wednesday that her father died Sept. 29 at his home in Los Alamos, California, an unincorporated community in Santa Barbara County.
While Ron Ely was not quite as well-known as Johnny Weismuller, the Olympic swimmer who played Tarzan in movies in the 1930s and 1940s, Ely helped form the image of the shirtless, loincloth-wearing character further immortalized by Disney.
“He was an actor, writer, coach, mentor, family man and leader,” Kirsten Ely said in
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