LIFE

Michael Jackson, in the Company of Stars

April 22, 2026 by Bill Syken

Michael Jackson appeared in LIFE when he was a mere 13 years old, but already famous as the lead singer of The Jackson Five. The photo, by John Olson, was part of a memorable cover story on musicians posing with their parents.

But soon after that photo ran, young Michael would branch out on his own, starting a solo career and transforming into the King of Pop. His 1982 record Thriller, featuring hits such as Billie Jean and Beat it, remains the best-selling album of all-time.

The biopic Michael, being released on April 24, 2026, traces Jackson’s rise to superstardom. What the movie does not deal with is the accusations of child molestation that came out against Jackson in the 1990s and shadowed him until his death in 2009.

The photos in this gallery are mostly from the 1980s and early 1990s, and come from Michael Jackson’s public appearances. While obviously giving a surface portrait, the pictures do demonstrate just how big a deal Michael Jackson was at the peak of his fame. Everyone wanted to be in his company.

The wide range of famous people he was photographed with includes Eddie Murphy, Elizabeth Taylor, Diana Ross, Whitney Houston, Sophia Loren, Lionel Richie, Liza Minelli, Cher, Brooke Shields, and more. The most random pairing shows the King of Pop with The King and I star Yul Brenner. One photo of Michael Jackson with fellow pop icon Madonna remains among the top sellers in the LIFE photo store.

On more than one occasion Jackson was also photographed future president Donald Trump. The two were close enough that when Jackson died at age 50 due to acute propofol intoxication, Trump offered a remembrance of Jackson to TIME magazine. Trump praised the pop star’s talent, genius and overwhelming popularity while acknowledging Jackson’s troubled state in his later years. Trump predicted to TIME, “He’s not going to be remembered for the last 10 years; he’s going to be remembered for the first 35 years.”

The Jackson Five and their parents in 1970: (clockwise L-R): Jackie, parents Joe and Katherine, Marlon, Tito, Jermaine and Michael in their backyard.

John Olson /The LIFE Picture Collection © Meredith Corporation

Michael Jackson and Diana Ross.

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Michael Jackson and Elizabeth Taylor.

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Michael Jackson and Liza Minnelli, 1981.

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Michael Jackson and Olivia Newton-John, 1983.

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Michael Jackson with Brooke Shields.

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Michael Jackson with Cher.

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Michael Jackson and Yul Brenner.

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Michael Jackson and Lionel Richie, 1986.

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Michael Jackson and Whitney Houston, 1988.

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Singer Michael Jackson and actor Eddie Murphy in Press Room at American Music Awards, 1989.

Kevin Winter/DMI

Michael Jackson and Sophia Loren.

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Michael Jackson with his sister Janet.

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Madonna and Michael Jackson (left) arrived at the Shrine Civic Auditorium for the 63rd Annual Academy Awards ceremony, March 25, 1991.

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Michael Jackson and Donald Trump.

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Michael Jackson , Marla Maples and Donald Trump, 1992.

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Michael Jackson in concert.

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In 1950, Red Was the New Black

April 17, 2026 by Bill Syken

When it comes to clothing, red is not just another color. It is worn by monarchs and devils, and in general by people comfortable with having all eyes on them. A history of the red dress in Europe’s NSS magazine noted that “there are animals that have evolved to make their skin or their plumage red in the mating season, some flowers are red to attract the largest number of bees and birds – and even among humans red is the color of passion and danger.”

In its Feb. 27, 1950 issue LIFE ran a story headlined “The Little Red Dress” which declared that the color was having a moment, and that the red dress “may prove the ’50s first fashion classic.” The lead image of the story, taken by LIFE staff photographer Gjon Mili, showed models high-stepping to The Charleston, a 1920s dance craze that was again having a moment.

The brief story acknowledged the primacy of the little black dress even while talking about red becoming a popular alternative, and going on to explain in frank terms what it takes to pull off the new look:

The turn of the half-century has been brightened by a rash of short red evening dresses. “The little red dress” may be lace, crepe or chiffon, costs from $25 to $450. Designers feel it may take its place beside the “good little black” dress as a similar, if more specialized, fashion classic. The inconspicuous black dress covered a multitude of figure problems, was worn like a uniform with standard accessories (pearls, oyster pumps, white gloves). The red dress, definitely conspicuous, is developing its own requirements. The wearer must have a good figure, a sleek hairdo, matching shoes, and the dress itself must have simple lines to allow a solid concentration of color. This is set off my an emphatic splash of rhinestones.

While black remains king, red has certainly made its mark, including in the early 1950s. A ranking of classic red dresses throughout history had at the top of its list those worn by Marilyn Monroe and Jane Russell in the 1953 movie Gentlemen Prefer Blondes. LIFE actually had a photographer, Ed Clark, on the set of that movie. Alas, unlike Mili, Clark was shooting his photos of those red dresses in black and white.

in 1950 newly fashionable red dresses were modeled by women doing what LIFE called “the newly revivded Charleston.”

Gjon Mili/Life Picture Collection/Shutterstock

In a 1950 fashion shoot about the red dress, this model accentuated her look with red rhinestone-trimmed pumps.

Gjon Mili/Life Picture Collection/Shutterstock

This model accessorized her red dress with a red boa and rhinestone jewelry, 1950.

Gjon Mili/Life Picture Collection/Shutterstock

Route 66: An Invitation To Roam, and To Dream

April 10, 2026 by Bill Syken

The celebrated Route 66 turns 100 in 2026. It’s a milestone worth noting because the fabled highway captured the spirit of the age when car culture came to America.

Ever since Henry Ford began mass-producing his revolutionary Model T and made car ownership accessible to the middle class, Americans have been engaged in a love affair with automobiles and, in a much larger sense, with the enduring myth of the open road. Has there ever been a culture that extolled movement for the sake of movement as fervently as 20th century America?

And Route 66 was the epitome of that. The highway was referred to as the “Mother Road‘ by novelist John Steinbeck in The Grapes of Wrath. An oft-covered song by Bobby Troup identified Route 66 as the place to get your kicks. In American culture the road that ran from Chicago through Missouri, Kansas, Oklahoma, Texas, New Mexico, Arizona and finally to Los Angeles was much more than a way to get from point A to point B.

In 1947, Andreas Feininger made a photograph that might be the single most perfect picture ever made of Route 66. It is beautiful, of course, but it is also a remarkable distillation of an idea: namely, that the American West is a place where people find themselves, or lose themselves, amid heat, sun, open spaces, enormous skies.

(Note that the version of the photo at the top of this story was cropped to fit the page template, but below you can appreciate the image in its uncropped, open-sky glory.)

Feininger’s photograph, taken in Seligman, Arizona, is packed with “information”—cars, a bus, human figures, a gas station, a garage, towering clouds, an arrow-straight ribbon of road to the horizon—but it’s the emptiness of the space that is most attractive. It can be read as a metaphor for the blank slate that innumerable people have sought in the West. Here is where you can redefine yourself, the scene suggests. Reimagine yourself. Reinvent yourself. Then keep moving.

Like the American West itself or like the mythical West of our collective dreams, Feininger’s Route 66 feels both companionable and limitless.

Ben Cosgrove is the Editor of LIFE.com

Route 66, here shown in Seligman, Arizona in 1947, took on a special romance for those who yearned to strike out for adventure.

Andreas Feininger The LIFE Picture Collection/Shutterstock

The Politics of Butter vs. Margarine

April 3, 2026 by Bill Syken

Margarine became a source of political controversy in the U.S. soon after its arrival in the 1870s. The spread had been invented in France in 1869 by a chemist who had been encouraged by the Emperor Louis Napoleon III to create a cheap alternative to butter, but American dairy farmers did not welcome the competition. As documented in thishistory of butter vs. margarine in National Geographic, “In 1886, passionate lobbying from the dairy industry led to the federal Margarine Act, which slapped a restrictive tax on margarine and demanded that margarine manufacturers pay prohibitive licensing fees. Maine, Michigan, Minnesota, Pennsylvania, Wisconsin, and Ohio went a step further and banned margarine outright.”

And that was not all. Thirty-two states barred margarine makers from dyeing their product yellow (its natural color is white)—with Vermont, New Hampshire and South Dakota adding the extra requirement that margarine must be dyed pink. (The U.S. Supreme Court eventually overturned the mandatory dyeing).

But despite political opposition margarine persisted and grew in popularity during the Depression because of its price. By that time margarine manufacturers were using an updated formula which relied on vegetable oils rather than animal fats, as it had originally.

But the butter industry continued to flex its political muscle. A story in the May 29, 1948 issue of LIFE headlined “The Butter Lobby Wins” recounted its latest victory—and also the rising opposition.

Spearheading margarine’s counteroffensive was Edward Mitchell, a U.S. congressman from Indiana who had been a margarine dealer before entering politics. Mitchell posed for LIFE staff photographer Francis Miller in front of a phalanx of pro-margarine congressman, and was also shown hosting a margarine party in which he donned a chef’s hat and served up samples.

Another of Miller’s photos shows an anti-butter display from the margarine lobby which proclaimed “No food has a corner on any color.”

While the butter lobby won the day in 1948, two years later Congress turned around and repealed the margarine tax. And in 1967 Wisconsin, a dairy capital, became the last state to rescind its ban on coloring margarine yellow.

By then butter makers’ worst fears were coming true. In the 1960s margarine overtook butter as America’s spread of choice, and it built a commanding lead through the 1970s, ’80s and ’90s. But butter mounted a comeback and overtook margarine in the mid-2000s. With the taxes gone, the battlegrounds in this war became taste and health.

When it comes to health, the consensus seems to be that margarine is better for you because it is fats are mostly unsaturated—and that is especially true when the margarine is the softer variety that is sold in tubs. But butter generally wins when it comes to taste, and it is also perceived as being more natural.

So today the butter vs. margarine debate is really about the choice between what is better for you and what you enjoy more.

If Congress wants to try legislating that, good luck.

U.S. Representative Edward Archibald Mitchell (foreground) led the pro-margarine forces in Congress as they attempted to repeal a tax against butter’s chief competitor, 1948.

Francis Miller/Life Picture Collection/Shutterstock

U.S. Representative Edward Archibald Mitchell, in a chef’s hat, held a party for the pro-margarine forces in Congress, 1948.

Francis Miller/Life Picture Collection/Shutterstock

From a 1948 story on the fight over butter vs. margarine in Congress.

Francis Miller/Life Picture Collection/Shutterstock

For years many states prohibited margarine makers from coloring their product yellow, a restriction margarine makers fought against,1948.

Francis Miller/Life Picture Collection/Shutterstock

The Social Lives of College Girls, 1945

March 31, 2026 by Bill Syken

The World War II years were a tough time to be a young American man, with the draft carrying many of them away from home and into battle. In 1945, 12 million men served in the U.S. military.

That in turn posed a dilemma for many young women. Back then a woman’s average age of marriage was around 21 years old, so the absence of all those men was deeply felt.

An exception, though was Connecticut College, which back then was all-female The school’s campus in New London happened to be positioned near several military institutions.

Here’s how LIFE described the social life there in a story in its June 4, 1945 issue:

…At Connecticut College, girls have more boyfriends than in the palmy days when the college derived critical advantage from its strategic location between Harvard and Yale. In or near New London today are the Coast Guard Academy, a submarine base and two air bases, each one filled to overflowing with men. There are monthly dances sponsored by the Navy. There are frequent graduations at the Coast Guard Academy and accompanying activities. Along with the girls, the Academy attends Sunday services at the college chapel. There are picnics and baseball games.

The pictures by LIFE staff photographer Nina Leen show that the mingling between the two student bodies was wide and varied. One of Leen’s photos captured cadets chatting up female students who were bicycling by a bus stop.

According to the story 25 Connecticut College students had been married while they were at school. Many Connecticut College women had studied up on military matters and politics so as to be better able to converse with the cadets. “But the rewards are great,” wrote LIFE. “On weekends there are always extra men and consequent fun for all the girls, that is, except for the married ones whose husbands have been transferred.”

For those students, marriage meant awaiting letters and worrying whether their husbands would come home safe. It’s worth noting that the issue date in which this story ran is two days before D-Day, a major battle in which about 2,500 Americans were killed, and which also proved to be a turning point in the war.

Coast Guard cadets came to pick up their dates at Connecticut College, 1945.

Nina Leen/Life Picture Collection/Shutterstock

Girls entertained their boyfriends at Connecticut College, 1945.

Nina Leen/Life Picture Collection/Shutterstock

Students at Connecticut College, which was then an all-female institution, stopped to chat with Coast Guard cadets from the nearby base, 1945.

Nina Leen/Life Picture Collection/Shutterstock

Students at Connecticut College, which was then an all-female institution, often socialized with cadets from the nearby Coast Guard base, 1945.

Nina Leen/Life Picture Collection/Shutterstock

A Connecticut College student was helped with her chemistry homework by a Coast Guard cadet, 1945.

Nina Leen/Life Picture Collection/Shutterstock

A Connecticut College student and her husband had a home near campus, 1945.

Nina Leen/Life Picture Collection/Shutterstock

Married Connecticut College students, some of them wearing their husbands’ Coast Guard gear, 1945.

Nina Leen/Life Picture Collection/Shutterstock

Students at Connecticut College, which was then an all-female institution, played cards, 1945.

Nina Leen/Life Picture Collection/Shutterstock

A Connecticut College student’s mirror was adorned with photos of her husband, a serviceman she met while at school, 1945.

Nina Leen/Life Picture Collection/Shutterstock

Two married Connecticut College girls read letters from their husbands who were serving in the military, 1945.

Nina Leen/Life Picture Collection/Shutterstock

Rest for the Weary: Images of Sleep

March 27, 2026 by Bill Syken

You don’t have to read too much about health to understand the importance of a good night’s sleep. As the National Institutes of Health puts its it, “Getting inadequate sleep over time can raise your risk for chronic (long-term) health problems. It can also affect how well you think, react, work, learn, and get along with others.”

In short, it’s really important. And with an eye toward that, we present this gallery of people getting some much-needed shut eye in a wide variety of situations, including some truly difficult ones.

In this gallery we see American soldiers napping on a transport vehicle after a fight during the Vietnam war. An image from World War II shows an American soldier sleeping on a pile of rocks during a campaign toward Rome. Also from World War II we see a child asleep in a Naples cave after having taken refuge there from the attacks on his city.

We also see people dozing in much more innocent circumstances—sometimes unintentionally. For instance, we see a U.S. Secretary of State, Christian A. Herter, and a U.S. Ambassador to the United Nations, James J. Wadsworth, nodding off during a speech at the General Assembly.

We also see several photos of children asleep during a school’s naptime. Two of those photos are from the U.S. and another is from Russia. A recent Penn study found that children who nap regularly are happier, behave better and are more likely succeed academically.

Boxer Billy Arnold knew the value of a nap—we see him catching one before a fight. Violinist Alexander Schneider, once described “as one of the most unquenchably energetic figures in the public musical life of the USA,” in shown sleeping on a sofa between concerts.

If seeing all these photos makes you think about getting a better night’s sleep, here’s a story with some helpful advice. One of the tips is to nap when you need to—a command many of the people in these photos were ready to obey.

Elementary school children took a rest period in classroom in the coal mining town of Nanty Glo, Pennsylvania, April 1943.

Alfred Eisenstaedt/Life Picture Collection/Shutterstock

Children napped during the school day, 1939.

Hansel Mieth/Life Picture Collection/Shutterstock

Naptime at a Russian kindergarten, 1960.

Carl Mydans/Life Picture Collection/Shutterstock

U.S. Secretary of State Christian A. Herter (front left) and Ambassador to the U.N. James J. Wadsworth (front right) dozed during speech at United Nations General Assembly, 1960.

Ralph Crane/Life Picture Collection/Shutterstock

Democratic presidential candidate George McGovern, next to his wife, Eleanor, slept on his campaign plane, 1972.

Bill Eppridge/Life Pictures/Shutterstock

Boxer Billy Arnold napped before a fight, New York City, 1944.

Alfred Eisenstaedt/Life Picture Collection/Shutterstock

Violinist Alexander Schneider napped between performances of the Budapest String Quartet in Seattle, 1957.

Gjon Mili/Life Picture Collection/Shutterstock

Author W. Somerset Maugham napped in a hammock while summering on Cape Cod, 1944.

Alfred Eisenstaedt/Life Picture Collection/Shutterstock

Racing fans at the Indianapolis 500 in 1939.

Alfred Eisenstaedt/Life Picture Collection/Shutterstock

Spectators at Cape Kennedy, Florida dozed atop of cars awaiting the takeoff of the Apollo 11 mission to the moon, 1969.

Bill Eppridge/Life Picture Collection/Shutterstock

Boys slept on subway car during a family trip to New York City, 1959.

Stan Wayman/Life Picture Collection/Shutterstock

American Marines of 7th Regiment took the chance to sleep in an amphibious landing vehicle following intense fighting in the area around Cape Batangan during the Vietnam War, 1965..

Paul Schutlzer/Life Picture Collection/Shutterstock

An American soldier slept on a pile of rocks during the drive towards Rome, 1944.

Carl Mydans/Life Pictures/Shutterstock

Members of Provincial National Police Chief “Tiger” Kim Chong Yon’s police volunteers slept before he sent them out to guard supply routes from attacks by North Korean-inspired Communist guerrillas that attack their farms and villages, 1952..

Margaret Bourke-White/Life Picture Collection/Shutterstock

A man napped in Hyde Park, 1951.

Cornell Capa/Life Picture Collection/Shutterstock

A child slept in a large cave in Naples, Italy where many had taken refuge from air attacks during World War II, September 1943.

Margaret Bourke-White/Life Picture Collection/Shutterstock

A child in a home filled with modern furniture found a place to sleep, 1948.

Joseph Scherschel/Life Picture Collection/Shutterstock

A United Fruit worker in Guatemala napped on a bench with his infant son, 1953.

Cornell Capa/Life Picture Collection/Shutterstock

A model posed for a story about proper sleep habits, 1943.

Gjon Mili/Life Picture Collection/Shutterstock

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