Pix Bare Obama's Cocky College Days

Long-lost 1980 student photos of debonair freshman emerge
By Rob Quinn,  Newser Staff
Posted Dec 18, 2008 5:12 AM CST
Pix Bare Obama's Cocky College Days
"You can see he is just posing, initially, but as the shoot goes on, he starts to come out," said photographer Lisa Jack. "He was very charismatic even then."   (Time/Lisa Jack)

Long-lost photos of college freshman Barry Obama smoking and posing with a hat have emerged with Time magazine's "Man of the Year" story. Photographer Lisa Jack says the 1980 photo shoot of her fellow student at Occidental College in Los Angeles reveals a "spirit of fun and thoughtfulness" in the president-elect.

After digging up the old negatives from her basement, Jack kept them locked in a safety deposit box during the campaign to make sure they weren't used for political purposes. She didn't see Obama for decades after college, but he recognized her immediately when she hailed him on a 2005 tour of Capitol Hill. "He knew exactly who I was after all this time," said Jack. "I was amazed." (More Barack Obama stories.)

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