Lennon and Yoko cover voted No. 1

NEW YORK — On what would be the last day of his life, John Lennon posed for photographs with Yoko Ono in a session with photographer Annie Liebovitz. One of the pictures, a naked Lennon curled around and kissing a clothed Ono, became the cover for Rolling Stone magazine's tribute to him.

That iconic image published a month after his December 1980 death has been ranked the top magazine cover of the past 40 years by a panel of magazine editors, artists and designers. Others on the list include images from the Sept. 11 attacks, the Vietnam War and of the first black woman on the cover of a national women's magazine, in the August 1968 Glamour.

The American Society of Magazine Editors announced the winners of the competition Monday during the American Magazine Conference in Puerto Rico. "Both the choice of a cover and the execution of a cover are crucial for any magazine," said Mark Whitaker, editor of Newsweek and ASME president. "Every editor wants their cover to stand out."

Coming in second was the shot of a very pregnant Demi Moore on the August 1991 cover of Vanity Fair, followed by an April 1968 image from Esquire of boxer Muhammad Ali with arrows in his body. The Saul Steinberg drawing of New York's West Side dwarfing the rest of the country, published in The New Yorker on March 29, 1976, came in fourth. Esquire's May 1969 image of Pop Art maven Andy Warhol drowning in a can of tomato soup took the fifth spot.

Other covers on the list include The New Yorker from Sept. 24, 2001, silhouettes of the World Trade Center towers against a black background; National Geographic's June 1985 cover of an Afghan refugee girl with haunted eyes; People magazine's cover from Sept. 15, 1997 — a black-and-white portrait of a smiling Princess Diana; and Life magazine's image of man on the moon from 1969.

There were a few ties, leading to 41 images being chosen.

Magazine covers can reflect the society around them, by how controversial they choose to be, said Johanna Keller, professor of magazine journalism at Syracuse University's Newhouse School of Public Communications.

"They're absolutely a societal barometer of what we find acceptable to look at," she said.

Good covers can range from funny to poignant, she said. "The ones that work best touch us in the same way that great art touches us ... stirring our very deepest human emotions."

The list was decided on by a panel of 52 magazine editors, design directors, art directors and photography editors.

Esquire, Time and Life each had four covers on the list. Eleven of the covers came from the 1960s, eight from the 1970s, three from the 1980s, 10 from the 1990s and nine from this decade. Thirty-two covers were photographs, while seven were illustrations and two were text.

Here's a complete list of the top magazine covers:

1. Rolling Stone, Jan. 22, 1981, John Lennon and Yoko Ono.

2. Vanity Fair, August 1991, Demi Moore.

3. Esquire, April 1968, Muhammad Ali.

4. The New Yorker, March 29, 1976, Saul Steinberg drawing of Manhattan.

5. Esquire, May 1969, Andy Warhol.

6. The New Yorker, Sept. 24, 2001, Illustration of World Trade Center.

7. National Lampoon, January 1973, "If You Don't Buy This Magazine, We'll Kill This Dog."

8. Esquire, October 1966, "Oh my god — we hit a little girl."

9. Harper's Bazaar, September 1992, "Enter the Era of Elegance."

10. National Geographic, June 1985, Afghan refugee.

11. Life, April 30, 1965, 18-week-old fetus.

12. Time, April 8, 1966, "Is God Dead?"

13. Life, Special Issue, 1969, man on the moon.

14. The New Yorker, Dec. 10, 2001, illustration of New York City map.

15. Harper's Bazaar, April 1965.

16. The Economist, Sept. 10-16, 1994, photo of camels, "The trouble With mergers."

17. Time, June 21, 1968, "The Gun in America."

18. ESPN, June 29, 1998, Michael Jordan.

19. Esquire, December 2000, Bill Clinton.

20. Blue, October 1997.

21. Life, Nov. 26, 1965, Vietcong prisoner with eyes and mouth taped.

22. George, October/November 1995, Cindy Crawford.

23. The Nation, Nov. 13, 2000, George W. Bush.

24. Interview, December 1972, Andy Warhol.

25. Time, Sept. 14, 2001, World Trade Center.

26. People, March 4, 1974, Mia Farrow.

27. Entertainment Weekly, May 2, 2003, The Dixie Chicks.

28. Life, April 16, 1965, dying pilot and helicopter crew chief.

29. (tie) Playboy, October 1971.

29. (tie) Fortune, Oct. 1, 2001, man covered in ashes near World Trade Center.

31. Newsweek, Nov. 20, 2000, image of Al Gore/George W. Bush.

32. Vogue, May 2004, Nicole Kidman.

33. (tie) Newsweek, July 30, 1973, Nixon White House and tape recorder

33. (tie) Wired, June 1997, "Pray."

35. New York, June 8, 1970, "Free Leonard Bernstein!"

36. People, Sept. 15, 1997, black-and-white portrait of Princess Diana.

37. (tie) Details, February 1989, Cyndi Lauper.

37. (tie) Fast Company, August/September 1997, "The Brand Called You."

37. (tie) Glamour, August 1968, the first black woman on the cover of a national women's magazine.

37. (tie) National Geographic, October 1978, gorilla with camera.

37. (tie) Time, April 14, 1997, Ellen DeGeneres.