I became a Playmate by chance. In 1964, when I was 18 or 19, I went to California for spring break with a friend from the University of Oregon. Her dad worked in Hollywood as an agent and helped get us a job as models on the reality show Queen for a Day. Next thing we know, we’re at a party and socializing with Hollywood’s finest. It was at that party that Playboy photographer Mario Casilli approached me and asked if I had ever considered posing for PLAYBOY.

Truth be told, I hadn’t. PLAYBOY was wildly popular at the time, but I really didn’t know that much about it. In my tiny Oregon hometown the magazines were wrapped in brown tissue paper and sold behind counters—it was fairly taboo. I took my time considering his offer and eventually came to see it as an opportunity to jump-start my career, so I said yes. I didn’t realize just how much that decision would change my life.

As excited as I was, I was afraid of what would happen if my family found out. I thought if I invented a new name to use in PLAYBOY and fibbed about my hometown, it ought to do the trick.

I couldn’t have been more wrong. One of my cousins was in a fraternity and saw the December 1964 PLAYBOY, quickly recognizing that Jo Collins of Seattle, Washington was really Janet Canoy of Lebanon, Oregon. Next thing I knew, my mom and everyone else back home had heard I was a Centerfold. I started getting calls from local newspapers; it was the talk of the town. I was quite popular among PLAYBOY readers too! They voted for me to become the 1965 Playmate of the Year.

Being a Playmate helped me make connections in the industry and eventually I legally changed my name to Jo Collins. I went on to do some more modeling and even acted in a few films. But after a while I got tired of how controlling it was. The Leo in me prefers to call the shots. It was still fun, but I wasn’t passionate about it. I didn’t think twice about skipping an audition if something important came up.

That’s just what happened in early 1966, when I decided to miss a big audition for Peyton Place so I could help Playboy with an extraordinary mission.

At that time, if you ordered a lifetime subscription and lived in a city with a Playboy Club, a Playmate or Bunny would personally deliver your first issue. Deployed in Vietnam, Second Lieutenant John Price and the boys from the 173rd Airborne Brigade came up with a clever idea: They wrote to PLAYBOY, asking for an exception to be made so that yours truly could deliver the first issue of their lifetime subscription to the front lines. It would be unprecedented—U.S. civilians were not allowed access to Vietnam—but Playboy was determined to find a way to make it happen. And that they did.

Playboy secured the proper government clearance, and the next thing I know I’m on an almost entirely empty plane to Vietnam, accompanied only by Admiral Hyman Rickover, Playboy staff photographer Larry Gordon and Joyce Chalecki, who was a promotion coordinator for the company and my Playboy “chaperone.”

I spent four days visiting with the troops and doing my best to boost morale, all while avoiding minefields and bullets flying around. I felt incredibly compelled by the soldiers’ bravery and commitment. A lot of people back home were protesting against the war, and that rubbed me the wrong way. It wasn’t about whether we should have been in the war or not; I just felt we should support our troops.

The trip was surreal and life-changing. It was a voyage hardly anyone else got to go on. Afterward, I became really involved with veterans organizations and charities. I would visit veterans hospitals every Veterans Day—sometimes with Playboy for their Operation Playmate program—and I still donate to disabled veterans groups.

My Vietnam trip apparently inspired a scene in Francis Ford Coppola’s 1979 film *Apocalypse Now.* His version is far from the reality I lived through. I was wearing fatigues, talking with soldiers and getting to know them—not dancing around for the men. I took a little offense to the film’s portrayal, but it’s just a movie. Larry Gordon made me a beautiful scrapbook of our journey, which I donated to the National Veterans Art Museum in Chicago. It gives a much better account of what really happened!

I married Bo Belinsky in 1968 and had a daughter. Bo was a baseball player, so I ended up being on the road with him during the five years we were married. During the divorce, Playboy reached out to lend support and I returned to the Playboy family. I worked as a Bunny at the Los Angeles Playboy Club until they offered me a job as a Bunny Mother at the Denver Club. I took the position and enjoyed it, but six months later a different opportunity came up and I leapt at the chance to be Playmate and Bunny promotions director in Chicago.

It was the perfect job for me. I was responsible for onboarding, publicity and press training for new Playmates and Bunnies, which was ideal because I enjoy being in charge. I even got to escort some of the Bunnies and Playmates on their press trips. It was fabulous. Once, I flew to Japan with the Bunnies. We were treated like royalty. If you think the Kardashians are a big deal, you should have seen how people treated Bunnies back in the day!

I spent three years as promotions director before deciding to explore other career options. My second husband was a savvy businessman, and along with running companies in Chicago and a Playboy Club in St. Louis, we started to get into the horse business together. I became one of the few women in Illinois with a license to race thoroughbreds. It was a money pit, but it was exhilarating! Eventually we lost interest in horses, and in each other.

I married a third time, to a well-to-do Hollywood producer, but today I’m happily single. I figure, what else is out there? Been there, done that. I was fortunate to marry three great men, and I’m content on my own. I have my daughter and granddaughter to focus on.

Working as a real estate broker in Chicago keeps me busy. I love it so much! I’m 75 years old and every day I wake up and put on my makeup, throw on my stilettos and get down to business. I have no plans to retire or slow down.

I love what I do, but I would have loved to be a forensic scientist. When I was growing up, career options for women were limited; before I went into modeling, I had planned to become a social worker. It’s exciting to see so much progress has been made for women’s rights, but there is still a long way to go.

I’m proud of everything I’ve accomplished. I’ve traveled all over the world, met everyone I wanted to meet and been on every talk show, from Oprah to RuPaul to you name it. Now my goal is just to live long enough to see my granddaughter find success. My daughter also does real estate—she’s the one who got me into it—and I feel so proud of her. We represent three generations of strong women.

I owe a lot of my confidence to Playboy. I became a part of the Playmate sorority, and we all support each other and lift each other up. My advice for current Playmates is to take pride in posing and don’t let people denigrate you. People criticize Hugh Hefner by saying he exploited women, but it was our choice to pose. And our bodies are nothing to be ashamed of.

I have never regretted posing. It turned out fabulously and opened my eyes to my own potential. You never know how things will go until you try. Good or bad, I sincerely believe everything is a lesson. You have to put yourself out there. Sometimes you’ll fall on your face, or, in my case, get divorced three times, but that’s life.

It’s been such a wild ride, let me tell you. I have 55 years’ worth of Playboy memories, and I treasure them all. But I focus on living in the present. Every day I pull on my stilettos and go knock ’em dead!