First Images of Tarzan: Pre-1918

Hollywood has had an influence on our images of Tarzan since 1918. Only Clinton Peetee Jr. had no images from previous sources to influence him when he did the cover for original Tarzan serialization back in 1914. It strikes me how this first cover sets so much to this very day. We have that most iconic pose of Tarzan killing a lion, but also his look which includes the headband. This set-up will become the famous Jungle Triangle of Jumbo Comics in 1940.

Fred J. Arting cheats with a silhouette on the hard cover version by A. C. McCurg in 1914. Arting’s Tarzan is not very robust. This could be Mowgli with archer equipment.

N. C. Wyeth had Petee and Arting in 1915 to base his work on. Wyeth was one of the true masters of American painting. This cover is not one of his best.

The unknown artist who did the first cover for All-Story’s The Beasts of Tarzan didn’t get the memo. He dresses Tarzan in the jungle version of a tunic. It was early days. readers did not yet expect the leopard print bikini.

The hard cover dust jacket from 1916 changes everything. Enter J. Allen St. John. He was Burroughs’ favorite cover artist. ERB would hire St. John when Burroughs would take control of his works and produce his own hard covers under the imprint of Edgar Rice Burroughs Inc. in 1923. As Frazetta was the Tarzan artist of my generation, St. John became the guy who painted Tarzan for the 20s and 30s. Later he would be replaced by one of his biggest fans, ERB’s son, John Coleman Burroughs.

P. J. Monaghan did the magazine cover for The Son of Tarzan and didn’t include much detail. (Tarzan always seems to be hiding behind something.) Again when he did Tarzan and the Jewels of Opar, Sweetheart Primeval (in which Tarzan has a cameo) and Tarzan the Terrible. Unlike so many illustrators after him, Monaghan avoids a full portrait of the Jungle Man in his splendid savagery. And perhaps this is what the movies will give us. The expectation of the full shot of Tarzan giving his jungle call.

Both Blue Book and Red Book ran series of Tarzan stories but never gave the vine swinger a cover. Their covers always featured portraits of attractive but polite women.

In 1918 Elmo Lincoln would silently changed things. Look at how Frank Hoban bases his Tarzan on Lincoln. (This is 1929, long after Elmo hung up his leopard leotards.) Lincoln was followed by a string of one-shot actors (including ERB’s son-in-law, Jack Pierce) who for the most part didn’t change his look. Frank Merrill has the same fur headband. It was sound and Johnny Weissmuller that cemented the average person’s idea what Tarzan looked like.

Every artist who rendered Tarzan after 1918 had to give some kind of attention to the movies. After Weismuller, this was doubly so. He was a big hit and the icon of Tarzan was now a household image. You see it in cartoons from this time period, whether it is Bugs Bunny or Woody Woodpecker. A character swinging through the jungle on a vine and giving the jungle call is instantly recognizable. No explanation necessary.

There was one place where the movies seemed to have less effect. Comic strips of Tarzan were very popular. In 1929 Hal Foster began drawing for the newspapers. (Thanks John!)This began a secondary image of Tarzan that didn’t really follow the movies. Foster left to pursue Prince Valiant. He was replaced by many artists over the years but Foster’s template holds.