Talk:Miss America/Archive 1

Edit Removal
cur) (last) 00:30, 3 Mar 2005 Infrogmation m (Reverted edits by 69.107.96.61 to last version by TheCustomOfLife) -- I don't understand why my edit was removed; I assume that Infrogmation deleted the external link because it linked to the Offical Miss America website showing winners--if so, this is an erroneous understanding of how the Internet is supposed to work, I guess based on what Frog thinks the law is, probably from the Playboy decision widely quoted in the popular press.  But then again this is Wikipedia, where you can be a law unto yourself... 69.107.96.61 08 March 2004
 * Your edit was reverted because External links go in the section of that name at the bottom of the page, and the official Miss America website was already linked there. I don't understand the rest of your comment. -- Infrogmation 08:00, 9 Mar 2005 (UTC)

Picture
We should update the picture at the top of the page once a year to that year's winner? I also put in a bot request on this topic. Cromwellt, Waarmstr 18:20, 26 January 2006 (UTC)

Miss [State] USA vs. Miss [State] America
(This comment could potentially apply to 50 or so pages so I thought I'd just say it once here.) When searching on Miss California it takes me to the page for Miss USA's California contestant. How should we/I go about clarifying this? I assume there should probably be two pages; Miss California (USA), and Miss California (America), with a note in the first paragraph similar to the Miss America page. Waarmstr 18:20, 26 January 2006 (UTC)
 * That problem was fixed recently, with a separate page Miss California, that links to other one. --Rob 04:46, 6 March 2006 (UTC)

Miss [State] Pages missing
There are a great number of State level pages missing. So far I've only been able to confirm the existence of Miss California & Miss Texas. If someone doesn't mind typing in all 50 state names maybe we could determine how many have pages, and add a list of needed pages here. We won't have to start completely from scratch as some "people" pages mention past winners. e.g. Marilyn Meseke from Ohio, even though there is no "Miss Ohio" page. Waarmstr 18:20, 26 January 2006 (UTC)
 * Unfortunately, those are the only two state pageants that have articles. --Rob 06:59, 6 March 2006 (UTC)

Picture width
I've made the picture at the top, Image:Miss America contestants visit Andrews 2003.jpg, wider than avergae, 450px, but I think it's justified. It's within the max recommeded (of 550 per Image use policy). Also, it's height is only 188 pixels. Wiki software happens to require us to specify the width, but not the height. But really, this image is no bigger than tall image that was 188 wide, and 450 tall. --Rob 02:56, 6 March 2006 (UTC)

Miss USA discussion may relate to this article
At Talk:Miss USA it's being discussed if it was good to put winners in a separate article, or if they should be merged back into the main article. I thought editors of this article, would be interested in that discussion, as its basically the same situation. --Rob 23:42, 23 March 2006 (UTC)

The article states: As of 2006, Mississippi remains the only state to have produced Miss Americas in consecutive years.

However, in the list of winners, it lists two consecutive winners (1935-1936) from Pennsylvania.

Am I missing something? Is this an error? An oversight?

Error in Article?
The article indicates that Mississippi is the only state to have consecutive winners (1959-1960). However, the article lists consecutive winners from Pennsylvania in 1935-1936. This is an inconsistency and/or error in the article. Please edit. Thanks. 64.12.116.199 04:09, 20 September 2006 (UTC) Joe

Article maliciously pumped full of hard-to-detect errors by 68.96.145.202
Hello all, My watchlist deals with topics unrelated to this article, but I followed a vandal here from one of my watchlist articles. You should know that 68.96.145.202 maliciously pumped the "winners" list full of hard-to-detect errors (for example, instead of inserting "Mickey Mouse", which would be clearly obvious as vandalism, he pumped it full of innocuous-sounding names that don't draw notice, overwriting the real names.) Someone interested in and knowledgeable about this topic should probably revert all changes back to at least 2006-10-15, or earlier, or else re-verify the entire article. There may be other anonymous edits earlier than that of this same type. Lumbercutter 15:19, 16 November 2006 (UTC)


 * It looks to me that 68.96.145.202 has repeatedly vandalized the article, and been fairly promptly reverted each time. The version at present as far as I can see has none of those vandalisms. Sorry, what is the problem? Wondering, -- Infrogmation 15:32, 16 November 2006 (UTC)


 * Oops, sorry, I did see that many of the vandalism instances were reverted, but looking at the history log I thought I saw some that had gone undetected. However, when I looked closer to find an example, some that I thought had gone undetected are in fact corrected in the latest version. Sorry about that, my main goal was to flag this for someone who was more familiar with the article and its subject matter than I am, so they could take a close look. Thanks for following up. Next time I will pin down an example before raising the flag! Lumbercutter 23:52, 16 November 2006 (UTC)


 * Okay then. Better being too cautious about vandalism than letting it slide. Cheers, -- Infrogmation 00:31, 17 November 2006 (UTC)

Controversy
At basically all events related to the Miss America pageant there has been protests contesting that the event is degrading to woman and a range of other issues. Shouldn't therefore the article have a "criticism" section detailing these controversies regarding the event. Canderra 22:49, 19 December 2006 (UTC)
 * More mention of criticism (and counter-criticism) is good, as long as its well sourced to notable opinion makers. Freel free to add to the article, while citing your sources. --Rob 05:14, 20 December 2006 (UTC)
 * I disagree with the sentence "Since then all Miss America pageants have attracted protests of varying sizes." I was present at the 2006 pageant in Las Vegas and there was no protest.  Also, there is no source listed for this statement.--Matt Sgarlata 17:44, 26 May 2007 (UTC)
 * I also disagree with this "criticism". As the State Field Director for the Miss Minnesota program for three years I was involvedwith and attended many Miss America Functions.  In three years, I don't remember more than a handful of "protests", and there was never more than a dozen people at any of them.Rapier1 (talk) 03:57, 24 March 2009 (UTC)

Wins by state
I have removed the following table from the article. It has numberous problems, especially that many of the early titleholders were affiliated with cities instead of states, such as Mary Katherine Campbell who was Miss Columbus, not Miss Ohio. --After Midnight 0001 04:00, 10 February 2007 (UTC)

States with no Miss America Titles: Miss Alaska, Miss Delaware, Miss Idaho, Miss Indiana, Miss Iowa, Miss Louisiana, Miss Maine, Miss Maryland, Miss Massachusetts, Miss Montana, Miss Nebraska, Miss Nevada, Miss New Hampshire, Miss New Mexico, Miss North Dakota, Miss Rhode Island, Miss South Dakota, Miss Vermont, Miss Virgin Islands, Miss Washington, Miss West Virginia and Miss Wyoming.

Miss America 2007
Why has the Miss America 2007 pageant received its own section? This is against Wikipedia policy as the latest occurrence of an ongoing event should not receive disproportionate focus. I agree the format changes need mention, but this should be integrated with other sections and the remaining detail placed in the specific Miss America 2007 article. Canderra 00:37, 8 May 2007 (UTC)

Miss Black America?
Removed a reference to Miss Black America in the text. It only has black and mixed-race entrants (not just black whatever that is) but then again there are numerous beauty pageants based on ethnicity as well as national origin within the US. So it is not unique in its construction and I'm not sure it is relevant to this article. There are numerous Miss Fill In the Blank America pageants so how is this one unique and notable in this instance? Doc Meroe 03:37, 4 August 2007 (UTC)

Ratings for the televised event?
Would it be possible to see the ratings for the television broadcasts through the years. I'm curious to know if the ratings have fallen over the years. —Preceding unsigned comment added by 24.213.57.50 (talk) 20:51, 31 August 2007 (UTC)

Question on early history
I came upon a newspaper headline recently to the effect of Miss Coney Island to go to National Beauty Contest in Atlantic City, I think from 1922. Did the early Miss America contest indeed take contestants directly from local contests below the state level?--Pharos 04:46, 20 September 2007 (UTC)
 * Yes, in the early years the state pageants did not exist. --After Midnight 0001 15:45, 22 September 2007 (UTC)
 * Shouldn't we have something on this in the article, then? Thanks.--Pharos 03:01, 24 September 2007 (UTC)
 * WP:SOFIXIT --After Midnight 0001 23:44, 28 September 2007 (UTC)

From the Criticism Section

 * The Miss America pageant has long attracted criticism for much the same reasons as the criticism attracted by other beauty contests, mainly that ugly women hate being reminded that men prefer the pretty kind.

Methinks someone slipped one past the WikiGoalie... 64.252.187.219 02:45, 21 September 2007 (UTC)


 * Thanks, I've fixed this now. If you want to try to fix stuff like this yourself next time, you can look at Help:Reverting.--Pharos 03:38, 21 September 2007 (UTC)

Miss World?
Do the Miss World and Miss Universe competitions pull from the winners of this for their American contestants, or from somewhere else?66.41.66.213 19:01, 2 December 2007 (UTC)
 * The Miss America Scholarship Pageant Program is it's own organization. You are thinking of Donald Trump's Miss USA program.Rapier1 (talk) 04:00, 24 March 2009 (UTC)

Reality series
I propose that the "Miss America 2007" section be changed to reflect the move to a reality-series based contest. There should be some mention of TLC's new reality series on both this article and the 2008 article. 72.242.166.132 (talk) 22:39, 8 January 2008 (UTC)

Bert Parks
Expunging any mention of this man is revisionist history at its very worst.68.218.143.38 (talk) 01:05, 14 July 2008 (UTC)Bob Taylor

Pack a suit case?
I do not believe an actual Miss America contestant packed a suitcase for her talent portion. A movie, Miss Firecracker, did have this occur. Other entries in the talent part of the article might also be bogus. Geo8rge (talk) 22:32, 22 April 2009 (UTC)

"Beauty" v "Scholarship"
This is specifically not a "beauty" pageant, and goes to great lengths to state it. According to the Miss America Website, The specific criteria are as follows: Miss America is both a business and a culturally specific brand that transcends being just a beauty pageant. Miss America herself is a critical member of the Miss America Organization marketing team and works to advance the business of scholarship and community service for women. The Miss America judging system distinguishes Miss America via a form of Olympic scoring where each contestant competes against ONLY herself. Preliminary Competitions Scoring

The Miss America Preliminary Competitions and their weighted score values are:

Lifestyle and Fitness in Swimsuit - 15% Evening Wear - 20% Talent - 35% Private Interview - 25% On-Stage Question – 5% Finals Competition Scoring

The scoring for the Miss America Finals Competition is weighted accordingly:

Composite Score - 30% (Top 16) Lifestyle and Fitness in Swimsuit - 20% (Top 16) Evening Wear - 20% (Top 10) Talent - 30% (Top 8) On-Stage Question (Top 8) Final Ballot – Each judge ranks the top 5 contestants in the order he/she believes they should each finish. The outcome of the pageant is based solely on the point totals resulting from the final ballot. —Preceding unsigned comment added by SeanNovack (talk • contribs) 23:51, 7 January 2010 (UTC)

Bikinis or 1-Pieces?
I was watching a very old Hollywood Squares from 1999 and the question stated that two years earlier the Pageant decided to allow a bikini choice for contestants. That would make the year it happened 1997 by my reackoning, so I'm filling that in.

Recent reverts
The last two editors provided some seemingly good stuff, but please source and correctly type the information. Discuss here to come to a consensus and then it can be edited on the article. Thank you for your contributions! :) 99.129.112.89 (talk) 23:49, 14 January 2013 (UTC)


 * (cur | prev) 11:07, 14 January 2013‎ 99.129.112.89 (talk)‎ . . (27,692 bytes) (-107)‎ . . (Undid revision 532898691 by 69.209.215.96 (talk) source and/or discuss on talk page; reverting good faith edit; possible errors) (undo)
 * (cur | prev) 11:04, 14 January 2013‎ 99.129.112.89 (talk)‎ . . (27,799 bytes) (-1,204)‎ . . (Undid revision 532914597 by SkeeterVT (talk) while much of it may be correct and improves the article, it is unsourced and some portions contain errors; reverting good faith edit; discuss on Talk) (undo)
 * (cur | prev) 20:44, 13 January 2013‎ SkeeterVT (talk | contribs)‎ . . (29,003 bytes) (+1,204)‎ . . (undo)
 * (cur | prev) 18:53, 13 January 2013‎ 69.209.215.96 (talk)‎ . . (27,799 bytes) (+107)‎ . . (undo)

Qualification of LesBiTrans, Married, Divorced, ex-con, non-citizen, non-virgins
What are the qualification rules? Can you be disqualified if you have had an abortion or when you have been born male or retained a penis after sex reassignment?{{subst:Unsigned|

A news story I saw years ago was that a contestant (or winner) was disqualified for having been through a wedding ceremony, although that marriage was annulled. — Preceding unsigned comment added by 128.63.16.20 (talk) 14:17, 16 September 2013 (UTC)

1977 on CBS

 * states nbc tv miss black America because miss America moved to cbs in 1977. — Preceding unsigned comment added by 174.20.20.198 (talk) 03:48, 4 April 2013 (UTC)

"post-dated" Miss America began in 1950?
I read that in an annual almanac somewhere. It's my understanding that Yolande Betbeze, listed as Miss America 1951, actually won that title in 1950 but is listed in 1951 because of the change to "post dated" Miss America (winner in September being chosen for the following year). Because of that change, it says there was no Miss America 1950. Yolande Betbeze's article mentions travel to Atlantic City in 1951, and if that's for the pageant it may have to be changed. — Preceding unsigned comment added by 128.63.16.20 (talk) 14:16, 16 September 2013 (UTC)

change to Las Vegas and back
I see a Miss America winner had a 16-month reign because of the change from Sept. (Atlantic City) to Jan. (Las Vegas) pageant. I am now seeing in the news that Miss America 2013 has stepped down after reigning only 8 months (from Jan. pageant in Las Vegas to Sept. pageant in Atlantic City); that's Mallory Hagan, who, it says in the news, is to be compensated for the shortened reign. — Preceding unsigned comment added by 128.63.16.20 (talk) 14:19, 16 September 2013 (UTC)

Comment
I purchased 6 tickets for the Show Me Your Shoes parade for $120.00. When I went to use them all the seats were taken because most people sat there without paying. I feel this was fraud but when I complained the ticket agency said they had nothing to do with this it had to do with the agencies that ran the parade. They said they had many complaints about this situation. Help me to find a way to get my money back? M Donnelly        9/23/13  — Preceding unsigned comment added by 173.2.77.147 (talk) 11:53, 22 September 2013 (UTC)

I purchased 6 tickets at a cost of $120.00 to sit and watch the Show Me Your Shoes. Miss America parade. When we arrived 45 minutes ahead of time there were no seats available in the section. People just sat in them and apparently no one checked to see who had reserved seats. I feel this was fraud to sell tickets this way but when I spoke to the Philadelphia Agency they said they would refer the matter to the Miss America people because they had many complaints. I would like some help in this matter. Marianne Donnelly, 173.2.77.147 (talk) 17:54, 22 September 2013 (UTC)


 * Marianne Donnelly, the Miss America contest has no connection to this article. I would contact them directly via their official Miss America website. Wikipedia is written entirely by volunteers.
 * I have removed your personal information as it is unwise to post contact information on a public discussion board. It can be used to send you spam messages. Liz  Read! Talk! 20:09, 27 September 2013 (UTC)

oh, for crying out loud
I have come across this:

>Miss New York Bess Myerson (Miss America 1945), the first and only Jewish Miss America to date, was selected despite official antisemitism; pageant director Lenora Slaughter requested that she change her name to one less Jewish-sounding.[7]

Notice this comes at the end of World War II, before and during which many Jews were slaughtered. — Preceding unsigned comment added by 128.63.16.20 (talk) 13:53, 27 June 2014 (UTC)

America pagent it isn't, due to pagent tampering from democrats (ie, NY)
"told you so - democrats would use your interest to slap you, an american, in the face"

the last 6 "Miss America" pagent winners were mostly foreigners and all had ties with NY,NY - and last 4 won representing NY,NY

this isn't a pagent - it's just communists using USA tax money to slap americans in the face — Preceding unsigned comment added by 72.219.202.186 (talk) 03:37, 19 September 2014 (UTC)
 * Seems legit. We should probably put this in the intro paragraph. Qwerty0 (talk) 21:38, 22 November 2014 (UTC)

2013 pagent
Was Ann Oldenburg the real winner of 2013 and she isn't a democrat from NY? Or is that my imagination. Tell me the party line. — Preceding unsigned comment added by 72.219.202.186 (talk) 03:47, 19 September 2014 (UTC)

hmm...
Is it just me or does the page not say at all who owns or produces the pageant!?!? Are we supposed to believe that it is a spontaneous happening which arises naturally from the uncoordinated actions of otherwise non-linked individuals? — Preceding unsigned comment added by 173.21.19.18 (talk) 18:54, 22 September 2014 (UTC)

Sounds like an advertisement for the pageant
Not a single negative word in the entire article. — Preceding unsigned comment added by Blocky1OOO (talk • contribs) 00:27, 9 December 2014 (UTC)

First sentence
Seems a bit bizarre (and contrary to what was claimed in today's edit summary, has never been established on the talk page). Is the competition called "Miss America" or "The Miss America Pageant"? If it's claimed that Miss America is not (just) a pageant, then surely references to "the Miss America Pageant" are intended to refer to only the pageant part of the competition (and therefore that phrase is not what should appear in bold at the start of the article). In any case, the name of the competition seems to be Miss America, not "The Miss America Pageant", so it seems strange to put the whole of that phrase in bold. And if Miss America is a pageant (or even if a pageant forms a significant part of it), should there not be a link to (that kind of) pageant, namely beauty pageant (an article which states that pageants are no longer all about beauty) somewhere in the first sentence? It's more important to people what a competition is for, rather than what the prize is. W. P. Uzer (talk) 21:24, 25 January 2015 (UTC)
 * I'm not sure the new version isn't even worse - it now places the emphasis on the organization rather than the competition, and implies that it's the Scholarship Program that's been running since 1921. There seems to be a great oversensitivity for some reason about telling people what this competition really is. Beauty pageant is the right link for this sort of pageant, since that article explains how such pageants have evolved into being not just about beauty, which seems to be exactly what has happened in this case. W. P. Uzer (talk) 07:03, 29 January 2015 (UTC)
 * I tried again to improve this, saying more explicitly what the competition involves (and linking to beauty pageant in a historical context). W. P. Uzer (talk) 08:20, 29 January 2015 (UTC)
 * I have to disagree with the "beauty pageant" label. That is what is WAS, that is not what it IS. The article explains the evolution, but the lede needs to be accurate to what the organization is currently, not what it has been historically. SeanNovack (talk) 03:20, 23 November 2015 (UTC)

What is with the two-second mention of the HUGE $45 million dollar lie?
So, just a brief search actually does turn up the 990 tax forms for the miss america 503(c).

https://www.citizenaudit.org/210600245/

His numbers aren't wrong.

There are now plenty of news organizations that are backing and carrying his claims and the wikipedia article barely mentions this - it's just in passing and the remarks don't even come close to summarizing the scandal of the gulf between $45 million dollars and what's actually disbursed. The response from the organization was terrible as well and the whole thing deserves a controversy section, IMO.

So, before I go making edits and changes here, I'm going to open this up for discussion to make sure that this isn't something that's being suppressed for some weird reason.

Matoleon (talk) 16:16, 17 March 2015 (UTC)

POV intro
The intro sounds like it was written by "The Miss America Organization" (MAO) and "The Miss America Foundation" (MAF). --Pmsyyz (talk) 07:10, 12 September 2016 (UTC)

External links modified
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I have just modified 6 external links on Miss America. Please take a moment to review my edit. If you have any questions, or need the bot to ignore the links, or the page altogether, please visit this simple FaQ for additional information. I made the following changes:
 * Corrected formatting/usage for http://www.missamerica.org/our-miss-americas/1940/1945.aspx
 * Added tag to http://www.patriciamorrisroe.com/sites/default/files/articles/Bess-and-the-Mess.pdf
 * Corrected formatting/usage for http://www.missamerica.org/our-miss-americas/1980/1985.aspx
 * Added archive https://web.archive.org/web/20131002114041/http://www.missamerica.org/our-miss-americas/2000/2001.aspx to http://www.missamerica.org/our-miss-americas/2000/2001.aspx
 * Corrected formatting/usage for http://www.missamerica.org/news/press-releases.aspx?id=833
 * Corrected formatting/usage for http://www.missamerica.org/news/press-releases.aspx?id=834
 * Added archive https://web.archive.org/web/20140227181045/http://www.zap2it.com/news/zap-miss-america-story%2C0%2C2752659.story to http://www.zap2it.com/news/zap-miss-america-story%2C0%2C2752659.story

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Vanessa Stripped
Vanessa Williams was "stripped" of her title because she was not an amateur: She had posed professionally for a photographer. That was the reason (and as far as I know) the only reason that she was disqualified post facto. If any apologies were necessary, the should have been issued by Vanessa. — Preceding unsigned comment added by 2604:2D80:882A:0:59D9:581C:29C0:E931 (talk) 01:15, 5 October 2017 (UTC)
 * Please note the rule above about how talk pages work on the Wikipedia: "This is not a forum for general discussion of the article's subject." There is more on that topic here:


 * https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wikipedia:What_Wikipedia_is_not#FORUM
 * The article Vanessa Williams and Miss America discusses this topic using WP:RS.-Classicfilms (talk) 05:25, 15 October 2017 (UTC)

External links modified
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I have just modified 3 external links on Miss America. Please take a moment to review my edit. If you have any questions, or need the bot to ignore the links, or the page altogether, please visit this simple FaQ for additional information. I made the following changes:
 * Added archive https://web.archive.org/web/20131004095427/http://blogs.villagevoice.com/runninscared/2013/09/fox_host_todd_s.php to http://blogs.villagevoice.com/runninscared/2013/09/fox_host_todd_s.php
 * Added archive https://web.archive.org/web/20150510013519/http://gothamist.com/2014/09/22/john_oliver_miss_america.php to http://gothamist.com/2014/09/22/john_oliver_miss_america.php
 * Added archive https://web.archive.org/web/20160406155056/http://www.missamerica.org/news/press-releases.aspx?id=938 to http://www.missamerica.org/news/press-releases.aspx?id=938

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