People: Jan. 19, 1981

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Eleanor and Franklin had done it. Bess and Harry too, along with every First Couple since. So, in keeping with a four-decade tradition, Jimmy and Rosalynn agreed to pose for Yousuf Karsh's camera. The Carters, says the famed Ottawa lensman, were "very cordial, warm and cooperative" as subjects. So was Amy's pet, Misty Malarkey, a copycat who insisted on being included in Rosalynn's portraits, taken in the Yellow Oval Room. The President, who had generously allowed two hours for his session in the Oval Office, proved especially understanding when asked to pose again for some shots that had been incorrectly exposed. "Mr. Karsh," sympathized Carter, "I'm glad I am not the only one who makes mistakes in the Oval Office."

It was the usual graduate-school scenario: three university professors facing down one anxious scholar during the dread oral exam on some deservedly obscure topic. Who cared? The President of Egypt, for one. And if Anwar Sadat figured the rest of his country should also take an interest, who was going to argue? Thus when First Lady Jehan Sadat, 47, defended her master's thesis (on the influence of English Romantic Poet Shelley on Arabic literature), the entire 2¼ hours were presented on national TV. At the end of the program, Anwar's angel got an A. Predictably, sniped some viewers.

It was a time-honored gentleman's agreement between the Crown and the Fourth Estate: when the royal family wintered at Sandringham, the press stayed on Fleet Street.

But that was before Lady Diana Spencer came along and captured the tabloid's headlines—and reportedly Prince Charles' heart. In a vain attempt to catch sight of the elusive lovers, a bevy of reporters and paparazzi besieged the rusticating royals at the private 20,000-acre estate 100 miles north of London, "hanging about the stables, photographing anything that moves," according to the Queen's press secretary. At one point, the reporters threatened to upset a Shetland pony carrying the Queen's three-year-old grandson Peter. These breaches of protocol produced some rare cracks in Her Majesty's regal facade. "I wish you would go away," she snapped at swarming newshounds. Prince Charles, too, had some unusually sharp words when he addressed a group of Fleet Street's finest. "I take this opportunity to wish you all a very happy New Year," he said with a bitter grin, "and your editors a particularly nasty one."

You thought Brooke Shields looked just nifty in her Calvins? Wrong — according to Fashion Designer Mr. Blackwell. The 15-year-old sex symbol's grownup getups earned her first place on Blackwell's annual list of worst-dressed women. "She looks like a Halloween trick without the treat," he sniffs. "Her mother should be totally condemned for this."

Runners-up for Miss Tacky, 1980: Elizabeth Taylor ("Not one movie star has worse taste"); Suzanne Somers (a fashion plate of "recycled spaghetti") and Bo Derek ("a butterfly wearing her cocoon ").