Cheetah, likely the last surviving chimpanzee star of the classic Johnny Weissmuller-era Tarzan movies, passed away last Saturday as a result of kidney failure at Suncoast Primate Sanctuary in Palm Harbor, Florida.
Remarkably, Cheetah — who played the same-named chimp during the early 1930s — lived to be approximately 80 years old. According to sanctuary outreach director Debbie Cobb, chimps, even in captivity, rarely live past 45.
“He was very compassionate,” Cobb said of the sanctuary’s celebrity chimp. “He could tell if I was having a good day or a bad day. He was always trying to get me to laugh if he thought I was having a bad day. He was very in tune to human feelings.”
Cheetah was purchased by Weissmuller’s estate in the last 1950′s, and brought to the sanctuary a few years later. He left no offspring behind.