The JFK Jr. Only His Friends Knew

A NEW BOOK OFFERS AN INTIMATE LOOK AT THE ICON'S TEMPESTUOUS MARRIAGE, HIS ATTRACTION TO RISK AND THE INTENSE CHALLENGES OF THE FINAL DAYS BEFORE HIS TRAGIC DEATH 25 YEARS AGO

- LIZ MCNEIL

On Nov. 25, 1963, John F. Kennedy Jr. saluted his assassinated father's casket in a televised funeral procession. It was his third birthday, and the heartbreaking image came to symbolize the nation's loss. The world never stopped watching, transfixed, as the little boy grew into a movie-star-handsome magazine editor, married Carolyn Bessette, who had a star quality of her own, and then died at age 38 on July 16, 1999, when the plane he was piloting crashed off Martha's Vineyard, also killing Carolyn, 33, and her sister Lauren, 34.

"People all over the world have this emotion invested in him," says RoseMarie Terenzio, his friend and executive assistant. "They thought they knew him as if he belonged to them."

Now, 25 years after JFK Jr.'s death, many of his closest friends have opened up about the man behind the myth in JFK Jr: An Intimate Oral Biography by Terenzio and People editor-at-large Liz McNeil, excerpted exclusively here.

"You wanna talk about the weight of legacy. Not only is John Kennedy the only son of a revered, martyred President," says his friend Ed Hill, "he's the son of a man who was publicly murdered. He had to define himself-he had to invent himself-out of that." And yet "John wasn't interested in the VIP section," says friend Jack Merrill.

"He didn't want to be behind the ropes; he wanted to be on the dance floor, in the middle of it. He would love some of these stories to be told."

In the weeks before her husband's death, Jackie Kennedy had asked the Secret Service to teach John how to salute.

Philip M. Hannan, auxiliary bishop of the Archdiocese of Washington