Students Posing in Playboy to Autograph Issue

As the saying goes, if you've got it, flaunt it. Or better yet, follow the example of three Harvard women featured in Playboy's new Women of the Ivy League" issue: flaunt it, then autograph it.

Kelly K. Johnson-Arbor '96, who appears semi-nude in the magazine, Kelli M. Keller '97, who is shown nude, and Amanda S. Procter '97, who poses in a diaphanous sweater, will all sign fans' issues today at Out of Town News from noon to 2 p.m. and at Christy's from 4 p.m. to 6 p.m.

"It's for publicity," Johnson-Arbor said. "We've been doing a lot of promotional things."

Johnson-Arbor and Keller publicize the autograph session in an article in today's Boston globe, which features a photo of the two standing by the statue of John Harvard.

Keller and Procter will also announce the autograph session in interviews this morning on KISS FM 108 at 8 a.m. and on WILD AM 1090 at 9 a.m.

Playboy is paying each of the women $100 to promote the issue, Keller said.

Playboy Eastern Division Manager Robert J. Cermak predicted that today's signing will attract a crowd of "hundreds, mostly students who want to see the ladies who appeared in the magazine."

The three women say they will not be specially dressed for today's autograph session.

"We're not really coordinating, trying to look sexy or businesslike," Keller said.

Yesterday, the women were preparing for a busy day based on the crowds who showed up to publicity events already held at other Ivies.

"At Cornell, 700 copies were sold at the first autograph session, which is unheard of...I think Harvard Square will get much more people because it's such a college-oriented place," Cermak said yesterday.

Keller said "it will probably be just people walking by. It depends on how many people are in Harvard Square, I guess, or who's interested."

The interested parties hopefully won't include protesters, Keller added. But she could handle it if they showed up.

"I'm not worried," she said. "If [protesters] had any questions for me or problems with me, I'd be glad to answer them."

No one openly protested Thursday's autograph session by Yale students who posed in the pictorial--even though, or perhaps because, protesting streakers were featured prominently.

Both Johnson-Arbor and Keller said their parents and friends had no problems with their appearance in the magazine or in the issue's promotion events.

"My friends were all very positive about it, and my mother is a former Playboy bunny, so she was excited," Johnson-Arbor said. "My father saw it, and he thought it was fine."

"I think if I did a nude it would be more of a controversy," Johnson-Arbor added. "But actually, there are girls in the J. Crew catalogue this month who showed the same amount I did [in the magazine]."

"Nobody has really said anything bad or discouraged me," Keller said.

Eight Harvard women are in the Ivy League issue, which hit news-stands last week.

In addition to Johnson-Arbor, Keller and Procter, five fully clothed students appear in a group shot: Leslie Yahia '96, Bethany '96, Suzanne M. '95, Anne K. Bingham '97 and Nadia Boulos '96.

The issue also features photographs of women from Brown, Yale, Cornell, Dartmouth, Columbia, Princeton and the University of Pennsylvania, in various states of undress.

The issue also features photographs of women from Brown, Yale, Cornell, Dartmouth, Columbia, Princeton and the University of Pennsylvania, in various states of undress.