LIFE Celebrates 75 Years!
November 2011
Celebrities Remember: My LIFE Story
Over its 2,000-plus issues, LIFE magazine -- the premier photo magazine of its time, known not only in the United States but around the world -- featured countless personalities, from cinema stars to sports heroes, politicians to pop idols. What was it like to be on the cover, beside that iconic red-and-white logo? How did it feel to open the magazine and see yourself splashed across eight pages? To celebrate the magazine's 75th anniversary, LIFE.com checked in with several famous folks who know -- from Sophia Loren and Mia Farrow to David Cassidy and beyond. Here, they reminisce about their LIFE shoots and how appearing in the magazine affected their lives.
I Was in LIFE: Stars Look Back
David Cassidy on Making LIFE's Cover in 1971
Calling LIFE.com from the road in Los Angeles, the biggest teen idol of the 1970s -- now 61 and still performing, to the delight of his huge fanbase -- recalled what a week in his life looked like around the time this issue hit stands. "I worked all day on the television set [of The Partridge Family], on lunch hour I would either do an interview or a photo session. . . . At 7:10 I would leave and drive over the hill and I would record [music]. And on the weekends, on Friday night when we would wrap on the show, I would get on an airplane and fly to do two shows on Saturday and two shows on Sunday. . . . It was beyond exhausting, but I tell you what – it was absolutely amazing." He also made the covers of TV Guide (six times, by his count) and Rolling Stone ("the fastest- and largest-selling issue until John Lennon passed -- [publisher] Jann Wenner told me that") -- but Cassidy's LIFE cover, published when he was 21 and as hugely famous as Justin Bieber is today, holds a special place in his heart. "It's such a legendary publication. . . . And it was interesting because [my stepmother] Shirley Jones, when she broke out at 19 years old, she did Oklahoma! and Carousel, and she became the musical sweetheart of the '50s as a teenager. I remember when [my cover] came out -- we had what they used to call Perma Plaques or something like that -- and she put mine next to hers. . . . It was a wonderful thing, a tribute to my family."
Photo: Bob Peterson/LIFE Magazine
Oct 29, 1971
