Pageant News Bureau - Kandice Pelletier 2

P a g e a n t N e w s B u r e a u

We eye Kandy

Photos by Joe Whiteko / PNB

Officially, she's Miss New York, the first representative of the Empire State in the new, dramatically overhauled Miss America system. Her full name is Kandice Pelletier.

But we call her the Kandy Girl.

It's not a very original nickname. Maybe it sounds like something that a schoolboy with a crush would dream up. But it will stick, we're certain. Just look at her. Everything about her says "sweet." (Pageant fans know that she's a former National Sweetheart.)

She has an almost shockingly bright smile, the kind that could melt ice. (She may need it on the Boardwalk in January.) She has Georgia honeysuckle in her voice. (That's where she came from.) She has big, adorable eyes like a young Joan Crawford.

And she has legs.

The Kandy Girl's legs are beyond mere description. She's a Rockette, but hers are not just Rockette legs. They're a whole new species of gams. Superlegs. Sugarlegs. Long stems of a New York rose. Legs that defy any nickname we can give them. Sorry.

Legendary PNB photographer Joe Whiteko was there when the Kandy Girl was crowned Miss New York. It was a summer night in a charming city called Watertown. She smiled, she danced, she won. She had the people in the palm of her hand, he told us. He captured those moments for history. Otherwise, you wouldn't believe it.

More about Kandice Pelletier ...

P a g e a n t N e w s B u r e a u