John F. Kennedy Jr. Was ‘Thoroughly Amused’ by His Sexiest Man Alive Title

Editors tell all! In honor of the 40th anniversary of Sexiest Man Alive, PEOPLE editors share the untold stories behind some of the splashiest cover stars.. Here, Editor at Large Liz McNeil — who cowrote JFK Jr.: An Intimate Oral Biography with Rosemarie Terenzio — shares stories from the book about John F. Kennedy Jr.’s time in the sexy spotlight.

“Going into 1988, there wasn’t an obvious candidate for Sexiest Man Alive,” recalls Jim Seymore, PEOPLE’s then Executive Editor. That was until a picture of JFK Jr. playing football without a shirt in Central Park came across his desk. “That’s it,” says Seymore. “The Sexiest Man Alive.”

The choice was instinctual – if not always quantifiable. “The choice was determined by that indefinable quality of heat,” notes Seymore. And no one was hotter — or more beloved than the charming and handsome 28-year-old son of the 35th president and Jacqueline Kennedy Onassis, an NYU law student then dating Christina Haag, whom he’d met at Brown University.

“This was just a slam dunk,” says Seymore of the decision to go with John.

Reporter Victoria Balfour was tasked with getting details on John’s life. “I was told to keep it under wraps. No one was to know,” she says. “I remember talking to some model who’d dated him and she said, ‘Oh is he single again?’ and I said, ‘I don’t think so.’” When, by chance, Balfour ran into John getting out of a car with his dry cleaning on Christmas Day on Central Park West, she thought, “John, if you only knew what we were up to.” She adds: “It was exciting to be underground on that story. It wasn’t like it was Watergate, like I was getting Deep Throat. I was just a reporter trying to get crumbs.”

According to Art Director Hilli Pitzer, photo research was a pleasure. “Every image that came in was better than the one before… Let me tell you, he was not retouched.”

But it was more than skin deep. With John, there was also an emotional element. Says PEOPLE’s then Managing Editor Jim Gaines, “They were buying the little boy who saluted. Everybody felt for him. The fact he was also gorgeous made it easy.”

The cover was a sensation — and the name stuck. “We gave him a merciless ribbing and he reveled in it,” says Brown classmate and friend Gary Ginsberg, “He was thoroughly amused.”

Still, it brought challenges. The paparazzi got much more intense — and more constant. But he took it all in stride. Says his best friend Robbie Littell, “He didn’t want to be chased around but he loved the attention…so the idea of ​​being Sexiest Man Alive was like, ‘Yeah, exactly. Unfortunately they’re gonna pick another one someday.’”

The big reveal of 2025’s Sexiest Man Alive will be announced on Nov. 3. Mark your calendars!