There She Is, Mary Campbell, The Only Two Time Miss America
Growing up I have slight memories of the Miss America Beauty Pageant: mostly of the perennial emcee Bert Parks singing the “There She Is, Miss America” song, while some young woman was given flowers and started crying.
The Miss America Beauty Pageant and all beauty pageants are generally a bore. They are really thinly disguised T & A shows.
But back in the 1920’s when the Miss America Beauty Pageant began, things were set up a little differently.
In 1922 Mary Campbell was named the winner of the second Miss America Beauty Pageant. Nothing extraordinary in that. As you can see in the above portrait and below that Mary Campbell was not breathtakingly beautiful, but still an attractive girl.
But what caught my attention was that this 17-year-old was not just the winner of the Miss America Beauty Pageant in 1922, but also the winner of the pageant in 1923!
How Mary Campbell became the only two time Miss America winner is an amusing story.
Mary Campbell did not even consider herself the least bit good-looking. In 1922 when Campbell was watching the preliminaries for an Ohio beauty contest, a judge suggested she enter the contest. She did and surprisingly won the contest becoming “Miss Columbus.”
Later she was told she won because of her figure, which was 35-26-36. Being self admittedly very naive, Campbell did not even know what a “figure” was. She asked her mother who replied, “It’s none of your business.” Continue reading →
Reading old Life magazines, you can come across some unusual pictorials and stories. This graphically illustrated story from 1940 could lead you to vegetarianism. Unlike dog and cat shows, livestock shows don’t necessarily have a happy ending for the winner.
