The Thirty-One 1933 Miss America Contestants
Final standings and follow-up information

[Click on any Picture for larger view]

30 contestants with organizer Armand Nichols (the 30 here include Miss Atlantic City who was not a competitor)
Note: Misses Maine and Oklahoma are missing from the photo -- Maine had no bathing suit and Oklahoma was in the hospital

State	Rank*	First Name	Maiden Name	Married Name(s)	Date of Birth	Date of Death	# children
Arkansas	DQ-M	Vivian	Ferguson	Stanley, ?	~1912 ?	?	?
California	3**, EG-3	Blanche	McDonald	Herman, Flever	10/3/1914 ME	9/5/1982 CA	1+
Connecticut	1, EGSF	Marion	Bergeron	Ruhlman, McKnight, Setzer	5/3/1918 CT	10/22/2002 OH	3
DC	SF	Rita	Burns	LeCuyer	6/28/1914 DC	9/8/1971 CA	2
Delaware		Victoria	George	Lusardi	8/5/1914 DE	3/17/2003 DE	4
Idaho	DQ-R	Margaret	Wittman	Salm	2/8/1914 WA	12/17/1964 CA	0
Illinois	DQ-R	Lillian	Kroener	Rubesa	4/13/1915 MO	9/8/2004 CA	2
Iowa	DQ-R	Eleanor	Dankenbring	Hay	3/7/1913 IA	10/14/1974 MD	4
Kansas		Pauline	Sayre	Blair	9/20/1909, KS	5/1983 NV	0
Kentucky	SF	Lucille	Rader	Cyrus	9/11/1918 KY	12/16/2006 FL	2
Louisiana	SF	Marjorie	Hagler	Dial	6/12/1915 LA	2/7/1997 LA	3
Maine	SF, EGSF	Iva	Stewart	Burkholder	1/5/1914 NH	3/1985 CA	1+
Maryland		Dorothy	Dennis	Schulze	7/7/1917 DE	12/8/2000 MD	3
Massachusetts	SF	Elsie	Taylor	(never married)	6/24/1910 RI	3/6/1998 NE	0
Michigan	SF, EGSF	Barbara	Strand	Soderquist	6/25/1916 MI	6/21/2005 MI	3
Mississippi	SF	Dorothy	Eley	Jané	4/5/1909 AL	4/2/2005 MS	2
Missouri	SF	Marie	Marks	Sillman, Moore, ?	~Feb 1918 MO	?	?
New Hampshire		Leita	Laugley	?	?	?	?
New Jersey	SF, EG-2	Gertrude	Christman	(used Christman)	5/7/1918 NJ	12/28/2003 CA	2
New Mexico		Julia	Valdez	Rhodes, Prewitt	9/23/1914 CO	5/6/2007 NM	1
NYC	WD, EGSF	Elsa	Donath	Shomer, Maharam	1/30/1914 NY	10/23/1993 CA/FL	2
New York (State)	2**, EG-1	Florence	Meyers	Barber	8/5/1912 NY	12/17/2001 CA	1
North Carolina		Leola	Councilman	?, Haught	7/29/1913 NC	5/26/1991 NC	0
Ohio	SF	Corinne	Porter	Marino	6/8/1914 OH	3/24/2001 OH	2
Oklahoma	WD	Joanne	Alcorn	Tomlin	10/15/1916 OK	7/1986 CA	2
Pennsylvania	SF, EGSF	Geraldine	Glassman	?	~1916	?	?
***Vermont		unknown	?	?	?	?	?
Virginia	4, EGSF	Evangeline	Glidewell	Newman	2/20/1915 VA	12/27/1997 VA	1
Washington	SF, EGSF	Gladine	Sweetser	Goerig	6/2/1911 MT	12/31/1987 WA	0
West Virginia	SF	Mildred	Fetty	Little, Geppert	5/22/1913 WV	7/9/1997 FL	3
Wisconsin	SF	Marie	Huebner	Raimer	9/24/1913 WI	2/15/2007 WA	4

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* KEY:  In the Miss America Pageant:  1=Winner;  2=First Runner-Up;  3=Second Runner-Up;  4=Third Runner-Up;  SF=Semi-Finalist;  WD=Withdrew;  DQ-M=Disqualified-Married;  DQ-R=Disqualified-Residency
In the Evening Gown Competition:  EG-1=winner;  EG-2=First Runner-up;  EG-3=Second Runner-up;  EGSF=Semi-Finalist

A big thank you to Louis Meisel for making copies for me of the panorama picture at the top of this page. This was the picture that started his Miss America panorama collection; now he is only missing 1943. Visit his gallery at www.meiselgallery.com/LKMG/. He is the author of 13 books, mostly on pinups and photorealism, a term he coined.

Picture of top 12 finalists (still seeking better quality copy).

"While Miss Florence Meyers, representing New York, and Miss Blanche McDonald, New York's State's pride, [sic] looked on while Director General Nichols Saturday night crowned Miss Marion Bergeron, "Miss Connecticut," in the Pageant, as "Miss America," queen of the 21 beauties in the final judging. The other two girls were runners up." - Atlantic City newspaper: Sep 11, 1933

** There has been much confusion over who was second (first runner-up) and who was third (second runner-up). The Atlantic City newspapers and many others nationwide simply mention that Misses California and New York State were the runners up, usually in that order (which perhaps suggests that California was second). Even the Miss America Organization itself has listed both Blanche McDonald and Florence Meyers as second; until 2005 they listed Miss CA Blanche McDonald 2nd and Miss NY Florence Meyers 3rd (see 2002 list); starting in 2005 they reversed the standings, with Miss NY 2nd and Miss CA 3rd. Ric Ferentz, MAO historian, corrected the MAO site after locating several 1933 newspaper sources (paragraphs below). Note: most printed sources will have the incorrect information, as they were written prior to the 2005 correction by MAO; most online sources also base their information from these printed sources and are still incorrect; I personally revised Wikipedia.
• There were several newspapers with incorrect information. To date, I have found three: 9/12/1933 Massachusetts newspaper article (by judge Gladys Glad's husband! "At last there is an end. "Miss Connecticut" is the winner. "Miss California" is second, and "Miss New York State" is third."), 9/1933 Danville, VA article, and a 10/23/1936 Fresno, CA newspaper clipping. It is thought that Mark Hellinger, a colorful columnist who proclaimed he did not take beauty pageants seriously, simply made a mistake. It is thought that the Danville, VA newspaper (hometown paper of third-runner up Miss Virginia) perhaps used literary license to describe: "There was spirited competition between Miss Virginia and Miss New York State for third position, the judges after a difficult decision finally naming Miss New York."
• As mentioned above, most newspapers simply specified that CA and NY were the runners up, without specifying which was second and which third.
• However there were several articles that reported NY as second and CA as third, most notably, the 9/10/1933 Los Angeles Times article which specifically stated that New York was second, California third and Virginia fourth (in the headline as well as the article), as well as a nationally-syndicated newsclipping found in several papers that specifically states Miss New York State was second and Miss California third.
Note that NY 2nd, CA 3rd and VA 4th means that both hometown newspapers (Los Angeles Times and Danville, VA) reported on the finish of their hometown contestant correctly.

*** To date (2010) no information has been found on Miss Vermont, not even a name. No mention has yet been found in a Vermont newspaper of the local or national contest. She is the only contestant in Atlantic City who is totally unknown, although like Texas, Indiana, Florida, Nevada and Colorado, there may have been other states that chose a state representative who did not go to Atlantic City. It is certain she was from Vermont, as all contestants were required to provide proof of residency. It is uncertain if she brought proof to the pageant, or if she was one of the 10 out of the 31 contestants for whom telegrams were sent to the hometown mayor, and was one of the 7/10 for whom confirmation return telegrams were received in time by Armand Nichols. In any case, she must have been living in Vermont in 1933. (Note: This information is featured on Forensic Genealogy, and hopefully will aid in uncovering additional information.)

another view of just the 31 contestants

Early in the year, it was expected that there would be 49 contestants -- one from each of the 48 states, plus one from the District of Columbia (see 5/2 Fresno, CA article). Although 31 women showed up in New Jersey for the contest, four more had been expected, as the first Atlantic City newspapers mentioned 35 contestants -- but their list of states had just the 31. Several other state queens have been found, with references that they were to represent their state in Atlantic City: Texas (Aug 9th Denton, Texas newspaper), Indiana (7/19 Valparaiso, IN article) and Florida (newspapers). (Note that Texas is mentioned by columnist Mark Hellinger as being announced at the Pageant but not being there in his 9/12/1933 newspaper article, but he writes as a colorful columnist and not a serious reporter.) Additionally, there were references to three other states having queens who were supposed to show up on the Whistle Stop Tour in the MidWest: Nevada and Colorado (8/28 WV ad) and Oregon (7/31 Cape Girardeau, MO article). It is possible that especially in the MidWest, the Miss America Pageant might have been overshadowed by the newspaper advertising blitz campaign for the Court of Honor contest with its massive $5,000 prize for the opening of the Chicago World's Fair in May.

States with no contestant participating in Atlantic City: Alabama, Arizona, Colorado, Florida, Georgia, Indiana, Minnesota, Montana, Nebraska, Nevada, North Dakota, Oregon, Rhode Island, South Carolina, South Dakota, Tennessee, Texas, Utah, and Wyoming. (Alaska and Hawaii were not states in 1933.) (See map -- the blue are states that sent contestants.) Some (but probably not all) of these states selected a state queen; she simply did not participate in the national pageant in Atlantic City. It is expected that more will be found as more local papers are digitized.

The judges were given the names of just 25 of these 31 contestants to choose from for Miss America -- it is not known why the Atlantic City newspaper above on Sep 11 says 21. Miss Oklahoma withdrew the first day when she had to undergo an emergency appendectomy; Miss New York City withdrew the final night saying the contest was not "on the up and up" (and the Miss America Organization website lists she was disqualified due to professionalism); Miss Arkansas was disqualified as she was married; Misses Idaho, Illinois and Iowa were disqualified for lack of proof of state residency -- more on disqualifications.

Sources/Methodology - MAO (Miss America Organization) supplied me with a list of all the information they had as of 2002. I worked with Ric Ferentz (MAO historian) and the Miss Illinois Pageant Vice-President (Daryl Schabinger) to find more information from newspapers, etc. I had originally only wanted to locate the seven other MidWest contestants to share the group photos, but Daryl wanted to locate all 31 contestants. The 1920 and 1930 census data were used to find parents names and siblings (and the year and place of birth of contestant). Then, the SSDI (Social Security Death Index) could be used to locate date and place of parents deaths for obituaries that would list married names of children. Or alternatively especially brothers could be traced through the internet or SSDI. Generally, the state pageants had no historical information to add; several in fact were adamant that they had no 1933 contestant! As more archival newspapers are digitized, more information will be available.--Donna Hay, 2002-2010

Email Donna Hay with questions or additional information.