by Wesley Harris
The history of Miss Ruston survives in fragmented scenes of civic celebrations, theater promotions, business sponsorships, public votes, judges’ decisions, and long silences.
At first glance, the title seems to have been an on-again, off-again operation. Some years, a Miss Ruston was clearly chosen. Other years leave no obvious record. At times, the title was awarded in a beauty pageant before judges. At other times, the public voted.
Miss Ruston was less a permanent institution than a recurring civic idea, revived whenever Ruston had a reason to promote itself, and eventually overshadowed by the Louisiana Peach Festival pageant, which became the city’s more recognizable and durable beauty-pageant tradition.
The title seems to have begun in the late 1920s and early 1930s, during an era when local pageants, theater programs, and business-sponsored popularity contests were common forms of public entertainment. These early contests did not always resemble the later Miss America-style pageants. They were often staged by theaters or civic groups and reflected the commercial and social life of the town.
One early example came in 1929, when the Kidd-Astor Theatre (later renamed the Rialto and then the Dixie) held a children’s beauty contest. More than 50 youngsters were entered, and judges from Farmerville were given what the newspaper called the “impossible task” of choosing the winners. Little Martha Alice Davis, the 4-year-old daughter of Dr. and Mrs. Paul Davis, was awarded the title of “Miss Ruston.” Anne Goyne, daughter of Mayor and Mrs. Charles C. Goyne, placed second, and Margaret Lindsey placed third.
By 1931, the Rialto Theatre was again the setting for a “Miss Ruston” contest, this time among 47 little girls. Ann Carolyn Davis, representing C. C. Alley Service Station, was named Miss Ruston. Barbara Ann Brooks placed second. As with many contests of the period, local businesses sponsored contestants, giving the event the flavor of both pageant and town promotion.
The 1932 contest placed Miss Ruston squarely in the Depression-era world of local sponsorships and public spectacle. Beauty pageants were entertainment, but they were also business promotions. The contestants carried not only their own names, but the names of merchants, cafes, service stations, newspapers, drug stores, and other Ruston concerns.
Dorothy Harrell was named Miss Ruston 1932. She represented watchmaker A. P. Taliaferro. Her maids of honor were Frances Niven, representing B. F. McClure and Company as “Miss Sun Proof,” and Winnifred Spencer, sponsored by The Daily Leader Publishing Company as “Miss Daily Leader.”
That contest was decided by judges from Shreveport, New Orleans, and Houston. Mayor Goyne presented Harrell with a silver trophy. She also received a 30-day pass to the Rialto and a case of Dr Pepper. Her maids of honor received theater passes, and all contestants were given passes to see “The Champ,” starring Wallace Beery and Jackie Cooper.
The prizes sound quaint now, but they reveal the character of the event. This was not yet a polished scholarship pageant. It was a town event, staged under theater lights, supported by businesses, and folded into Ruston’s civic life.
The 1933 contest was significant because it celebrated Ruston’s semi-centennial — 50 years since the town’s founding in 1883. In a change from the 1932 contest, the pageant was tied directly to Ruston’s anniversary celebration, and the queen was selected by public vote.
In the days leading up to the semi-centennial, the newspapers followed the race closely. Dell Barksdale became one of the central figures. An October 3, 1933 headline announced, “Dell Barksdale Continues Lead in Queen Race.” The article reported she had moved ahead in the voting and was leading the field of candidates for semi-centennial queen.
The vote totals printed beneath the story show how much attention the race drew. Dell Barksdale led the standings. Other top vote recipients included Mary Ruth Holland, Charlotte Davis, Elizabeth Rainwater, Evelyn Ponder, Billie Mays, Jane Goyne, Sarah Rainwater, Dora Doughty, Marion Simms, Margaret Hadley, and Mildred Loucks.
The winner would symbolically hold the title until Ruston’s centennial, a promise later forgotten as additional Miss Rustons were crowned and there was no corresponding Miss Ruston pageant for Ruston’s actual 1984 centennial celebration. Whether the promise was forgotten, ignored or simply overtaken by later pageant activity, the contradiction became part of the title’s unusual history.
When the votes were finally counted, Dell Barksdale did not win the crown. Charlotte Davis did. The Cosmos Club sponsored Davis who was elected Miss Ruston by popular vote cast over the previous ten days. Her maids were Barksdale, Mary Ruth Holland, Elizabeth Rainwater, Jane Goyne, Margaret Hadley, and Evelyn Ponder.
The coronation was scheduled for a Friday evening during the semi-centennial celebration, with Miss Ruston and her maids of honor occupying places on a public platform in Railroad Park. The ceremony was part of a larger civic celebration that included music, speeches, visiting dignitaries, and former residents returning to honor Ruston’s first 50 years.
That 1933 semi-centennial race may be the best early example of what Miss Ruston meant. It was not merely a beauty contest. It was a civic ritual. It invited the public to participate, gave clubs and businesses a visible role, and placed young women at the center of Ruston’s anniversary celebration. It also showed how elastic the title could be. One Miss Ruston could be chosen by judges in a theater pageant. Another could be elected by public vote as queen of a citywide celebration.
By 1940, Miss Ruston had become a title that could represent the city beyond the local stage. Anne Goyne—the same child who had placed second in the 1929 contest—was selected as Miss Ruston to represent the town in the Ark-La-Tex coronation pageant at the Louisiana State Fair. An 18-year-old Louisiana Tech sophomore, her role was no longer simply to win a local crown, but to carry Ruston’s name into a regional event.
But no Miss Ruston was selected for an entire decade in the 1940s, including during the World War II years.
The title surfaced again in the early 1950s. A 1953 report noted more names had been entered for Miss Ruston: Dorothy Spinks, Victoria Andrews and Mildred Lomax, sponsored by the Tech Intra-Fraternity Council. Balloting for Miss Ruston was to begin that day. The contest continued interest in the title before the more formal Jaycee-sponsored pageants of the mid-1950s.
By 1955, Miss Ruston had entered a new phase. The pageant was no longer simply a theater promotion or a popularity contest. It was sponsored by the Ruston Jaycees and held at Howard Auditorium. The winner was automatically entered in the Miss Louisiana pageant, whose winner would compete for the Miss America title at Atlantic City.
The 1955 Miss Ruston contest had the structure of a modern mid-century pageant. It included evening dress, talent, and bathing suit competition. Tickets were sold for $1 for adults and 50 cents for students. Johnny Perritt, later Ruston mayor, served as master of ceremonies. The Jaycees used the proceeds for community projects, and the organization expressed hope the pageant would become an annual event.
The contestants were introduced with short biographical sketches, another sign of the pageant’s changing style. Among them were Joyce Mathews, sponsored by the Dixie Theater, an 18-year-old Louisiana Tech freshman and graduate of Ruston High; Bernie Singleton, sponsored by Selle Jeweler, a 20-year-old Ruston High graduate attending Tech; and Glenda Mathews, sponsored by Pacific Finance Company, a Tech student majoring in health and physical education.
Other contestants included Margory Swilley, sponsored by Hammock’s Service Station, a Tyler, Texas, high school graduate and Tech student who planned a dramatic reading; Jan Aline Johnston, sponsored by Western Hatcheries, the 1954 Queen Dixie Gem, a Ruston High graduate, and member of Tech’s Kappa Delta sorority; and Stella MacDonald, a Ruston girl sponsored by the Olympia Cafe.
Judges for the 1955 contest were Mayor T. C. Beasley, Tech President R. L. Ropp, J. C. Love, Mrs. A. K. Goff, and Mrs. Ragan Green. Afterward, a headline announced: “Misses Johnston, Stegall Beauty Contest Winners.” This dual-title situation is one of the most interesting moments in the Miss Ruston story. The same local pageant produced two representatives for two different pageant systems.
First place went to Jan Johnston, who advanced to the Miss Louisiana pageant, winning the state crown. First runner-up Lee Stegall also carried the Miss Ruston name, traveling to New Orleans to compete for the Miss Louisiana title in the Miss Universe contest.
By 1957, the title remained active in the Miss Louisiana/Miss America orbit. Elizabeth Jane Weingart appeared in the record as Miss Ruston. The 19-year-old Louisiana Tech student was studying voice and clarinet but her talent was dramatic reading. By then, the language of pageant coverage had fully shifted into the familiar mid-century format: age, school, talent, hobbies, sponsor and physical description.
Another factor likely shaped Miss Ruston’s uneven later history: The Peach Festival offered something Miss Ruston lacked—a recurring annual celebration, a built-in audience, broader publicity, and a direct connection to Ruston’s public identity as the center of Louisiana peach country.
Those deficiencies explain why Miss Ruston did not remain the dominant local title. The city did not lose its appetite for queens, contests, or pageantry. Instead, those traditions found a more permanent home in the Peach Festival. The Peach Festival queen became the more natural representative of Ruston’s public image, while Miss Ruston continued only intermittently.
The gaps in the Miss Ruston record show years when no queen was chosen, or at least no surviving documentation has surfaced. Sponsors cycled in and out. Rules and selection methods were adjusted. The meaning of the title changed. Yet the idea endured.
That may be the most Ruston part of the story. The crown was never fixed in one form. It could belong to a little girl in a theater contest, a club candidate elected by popular vote, a business-sponsored beauty queen, all eventually overshadowed by the Peach Festival queen.
Miss Ruston’s history is a civic scrapbook, full of missing pages, familiar family names, local businesses, college students, theater lights, public votes, judges’ scorecards, and ambitious promises. Its story is not only about who wore the crown, but about why Ruston kept bringing the crown back, and why another crown maintained a more enduring legacy.
Currently, Miss Ruston and Miss Lincoln Parish organizations affiliated with the Miss Louisiana pageant exist but they lack the following of pageants of past decades. Despite a comparatively low profile, they still provide opportunities for local young women to follow their dreams. Current Miss Ruston Emma Calhoun and Miss Lincoln Parish Sarah Cook participated in the Miss Louisiana contest this month.
