Miss America: from Vanessa Williams to Kimberly Aiken

Ebony, Jan, 1994 by Karima A. Haynes

KIMBERLY Clarice Aiken was just another college student watching the Miss America pageant on the big screen television in the common room of her dormitory back in the fall of 1992.

It was a typical Saturday night and the accounting and music major was doing her laundry as usual. She figured watching the pageant was a good way to pass the time between wash cycles.

As Aiken watched the crown being placed on the head of the woman who would reign as the nation's sweetheart, it never crossed her mind that the following year she would be crowned the new Miss America.

"I was sitting there watching the pageant with friends," the Columbia, S.C., native recalls, "but I never thought I'd be up there on stage."

Like Cinderella who swapped her dust mop for a drop-dead designer dress, Aiken traded her soapsuds for a sparkling scepter. But that's where the similarities end. While the young maid in the tale had a fairy godmother to make her the belle of the ball, Aiken worked her way up through the Miss America pageant system to become the fairest in the land.

Aiken is the first Black woman from the South ever to win the title of Miss America and, at 18 years old, one of the youngest winners. As the fifth Black woman to wear the crown, she is yet another hue in the browning of Miss America.

Like the Black women who captured the crown before her, Aiken must confront the continuing question of whether the crown is a relevant symbol of Black womanhood. Yet, she says she is proud to be counted among the beautiful, intelligent and talented African-American women who have used the title as a steppingstone toward rewarding careers.

Aiken is particularly grateful to Vanessa Williams, the first Black woman to wear the crown, for her historic breakthrough a decade ago.

"Vanessa Williams had to deal with the race issue," Aiken acknowledges. "She really paved the way for all of us."

The title was a springboard for Williams who was an unknown 20-year-old from Millwood, N.Y., when she was named Miss America 1984.

Williams is the most successful former Miss America -- Black or White. With numerous television and recording credits, she has transcended her title and is a respected artist in her own right. Rarely are the words "former Miss America" associated with her name today.

The multitalented singer and actress has appeared on television in Stompin' at the Savoy, The Fresh Prince of Bel Air, The Kid Who Loved Christmas and The Love Boat, among other programs. She is equally popular on the record charts with such hits as "The Right Stuff," "Darling I," "The Comfort Zone" and "Save the Best for Last," which was nominated for several Grammy Awards in 1993.

Willlams' success is all the more sweet because it came after she suffered the public humiliation of being forced to relinquish the title of Miss America after nude photographs of her with another, woman appeared in a men's magazine.

As a result of the pictorial, Williams found herself at the center of a national debate over the perpetuation of what many view as two divirgent and unrealistic images of women -- the pure virgin and the wanton woman.

With the help of public relations consultant Ramon Hervey II, who is now her husband and the rather of their three children, Williams recovered from the incident and turned what could have been a major stumbling block into a steppingstone.

Suzette Charles, first runner-up to Williams, was named Miss America to fulfill the remaining eight weeks of Williams' reign. She became the second Black woman to wear the crown.

Following her reign as Miss America, the Mays Landing, N.J., native, who studied voice and theater at Temple University in Philadelphia, had a successful run as a nightclub singer in Atlantic City, N.J. She also toured with Bill Cosby, Lou Rawls, Stevie Wonder, Peabo Bryson, Frank Sinatra and the late Sammy Davis Jr. The entertainer also hosted a music video program for Black Entertainment Television and emceed the Variety Club Telethon.

Currently Charles is working on an album and already released a single, "Free to Love Again," in the United Kingdom in August 1993. She also hosts a 15-minute arts and entertainment segment for the Bravo cable channel.

The third Black woman to wear the crown was 1990 Miss America Debbye Turner, who wowed the pageant audience with her quicksilver rendition of "Flight of the Bumblebee" on the marimba and stunned reporters at a post-pageant news conference with a self-penned Christian rap tune.

"Miss America was a great, huge steppingstone for me," enthuses Turner, who competed for nearly eight years, through 11 tries in two states to finally make it to the national pageant. "The title did not change my career goals, but it broadened my options."

Following her year as Miss America, Turner returned to the University of Missouri veterinary school and earned her doctor's degree in veterinary medicine. She has passed the national board examination, but is not a practicing veterinarian. Instead, Turner travels throughout the world lecturing on veterinary medicine, encouraging young people to excel and sharing her faith as a born-again Christian.