September 11: “There she is…Miss America”

On 11 September 1955, Bert Parks began his 25 year career as host of the Miss America Pageant. This night also saw the first performance of “There she is, Miss America.” This is also the first year that the Miss American Pageant was televised.

The Miss America Pageant began on 7 September 1921 as a beauty pageant in Atlantic City, New Jersey. The first winner of the pageant was Margaret Gorman. However, she was not crowned as “Miss America” until the end of her reign. She was the only Miss American not crowned shortly after winning the pageant. The grand prize for the beauty pageant was a three foot mermaid.

Lee Meriwether was the first young woman to whom Bert Parks sang “There she is, Miss America.” Before winning the title of Miss America, Meriwether had been crowned Miss San Francisco and Miss California. Later, she would become known as Betty in the long running TV series Barnaby Jones and as Lilly in the 1970s revival The Munsters Today. She also appeared in movies.

Bert Parks was not the only individual to make a first appearance on 11 September 1955. That evening, James Arness made his premiere as Marshall Matt Dillon on Gunsmoke. The series ran for 20 years with 635 episodes. Gunsmoke had originally begun as a radio program on 26 April 1952 with William Conrad starring in the role of Matt Dillon. The radio show would run until 18 June 1961.

When Gunsmoke made its television debut, the program was introduced by well known western actor John Wayne. In 1969, Meriwether and Wayne appeared together in The Undefeated.

    –Steven L. Berg, PhD

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Photo Caption: Lee Meriwether as Miss America. (top) Lee Meriwether and John Wayne in The Undefeated. (bottom)

6 Responses

  1. Aaron says:

    While the prize for winning the pageant used to be a 3 foot mermaid, the pageant now wards the winner and her runners up with a scholarship to the institution of their choice. The Miss America Scholarship program has made more than $45 million available to the winners and runners up.
    -Aaron Dowd

  2. Makenzy Wilson says:

    Not only does the Miss America Organization have a scholarship program available for contestants, it also offers community benefits. The Miss America Organization has been partnered with the Children’s Miracle Network Hospitals since 2007 to help raise awareness for local children’s hospitals. Additionally, the organization requires that its contestants raise a minimum of $100 to give towards hospitals locally, statewide, and nationally. The winner of the Miss America competition becomes the advocate for the Children’s Miracle Organization. Traveling about 20,000 miles per month, Miss America educates individuals on her standpoints while bringing awareness for children’s hospitals. Miss America winners have been utilizing their title to better society and themselves. In 1974, Miss America Rebecca King was the first winner to use her scholarship towards her education to become a lawyer. Shortly after, in 1988, Kaye Rafko won the contest and used her title to promote the care for terminally ill patients. Miss Rafko was the first winner to devote herself to advocate a social issue. Both winners used their reign to reflect the tradition of service and sophistication.

    (To view how the Miss America Organization helps Children’s Miracle Organization please watch this clip: http://www.missamericaforkids.org/MiracleStory)

    -Makenzy Wilson

  3. Kelly Gunn says:

    The Miss America Pageant has not always been what it is today. No African American woman participated in this contest until around 1970, but before that, they were still aloud to be in musical numbers when they were slaves. Until the 1940s, contestants were forced to complete a biological questionnaire tracing their ancestry to ensure they were not of color. The first African American to become Miss America was Vanessa William in 1984, but her crown was soon taken away from her due to the discovery of nude photographs of her. She was also the first winner who got her crown taken away. There was a woman named Theresa Uchytil who was the first notable contestant with a disability, but Heather Whitestone was the first winner of Miss America who had a disability which was being deaf. Although that was very shocking to hear, something that surprised me even more was the fact that this contest started out as a bathing suit contest to boost the beachfront economy by Atlantic. Today the contestants are still shown in suits, but when it comes to judging, that has the least percentage of effecting the final score. This in fact shows how much the Miss America contest has evolved overtime.

  4. Mary Rabe says:

    Nancy Fleming was crowned Miss America in 1961. She entered the pageant as Miss Michigan, but before that she was crowned Miss White Lake. White Lake is a small area in Muskegon that contains two small towns, Montague and Whitehall.

    Today Montague has managed to move into the 21st century with one stoplight located in the center of town. There are signs posted at each entrance into Montague proclaiming it as hometown to Miss America 1961, Nancy Fleming. According to the 2010 census Montague maintains a population of about 2,361 people. In the 1960 census, this small town had a population of 2,366 people. The populace that left Montague includes both Nancy Fleming and myself.

    Nancy left Michigan, and her quaint hometown, to have successful career as a television program host and interviewer. In 1978 she married radio and television personality, Jim Lange. In 1992, Nancy became a Master Gardener from the University of California. She spends her time working on habitat restorations, community gardens and promoting non-toxic gardening alternatives.

  5. Alex Kim says:

    The history of beauty pageants has been around even in ancient times. The first beauty pageant can be found in Greek mythology. In the Judgement of Paris, where Paris, the king of Troy, was asked to choose the fairest of the goddesses Aphrodite, Hera, or Athena. Paris choose Aphrodite, the goddesses of love and beauty, she promised Paris that Helene would be his wife.The abduction of Helene led to the Trojan war.

  6. Eden Gibbs says:

    Beauty pageants winners becoming celebrity actresses and performers is not an uncommon thing.
    Halle Berry was crowned Miss Teen All American 1985, and Miss Ohio-USA in 1986 and has since had an extremely successful career in acting. She was the first female African-American to receive an Academy Award. The award was given in 2002 for her role in the movie “Monster’s ball”.
    Oprah Winfrey also has roots in pageantry. In 1971, Winfrey was crowned Miss Fire Prevention, and Miss Black Tennessee. She has since made history with her television talk show, “The Oprah Winfrey Show”, when is became the highest rated television talk show ever. Oprah was also nominated for and Academy Award and a Golden Globe honor for her role in “The Color Purple”.

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