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Swimming superstar Johnny Weissmuller became a Hollywood star after winning gold, and American tennis player Helen Wills became the first woman athlete to become a global celebrity.

Among the heroes availing themselves of this innovation was one Johnny Weissmuller – later to find fame as cinema’s Tarzan.

Competing for the United States, Johnny Weissmuller emerged as the undoubted star of the swimming pool in 1924.

Requiring citizenship to compete as an American at the Paris Olympics, it has been said that Weissmuller hid his true birthplace and asserted he was born in Pennsylvania when it came to proving his identity.

A 1984 Sports Illustrated story stated Weissmuller had doctored his brother’s papers to make them his own – as his brother had been born in Pennsylvania following the family’s emigration – and that he was duly waved through the system and into the US team.