Pageant News Bureau - America's Perfect Teen

America's Perfect Teen

Pageant photos courtesy of Carvern Productions, personal photos courtesy of Laurie Byers

Laurie Byers with Natalie Arena, the 1998 winner

It's almost universally agreed that nobody is perfect. And millions of parents around the world can attest that no teenager is perfect. So how does a girl get to be called America's Perfect Teen?

PNB asked Laurie Byers to explain it, since she's the one with the title. "It's not really a question of being perfect," said the fresh-faced student from Indiana, "It's about striving for perfection."

Ms. Byers won her title on July 17, 1999, in Orlando, Fla., beating out girls from all over the country. At 14, she was the youngest girl on the stage. And according to Executive Director Carmine Verno, she is the youngest girl ever to be crowned America's Perfect Teen. "She's a very articulate young lady," he said.

Finalists: (from left) Virginia, Maryland, Laurie Byers, Florida, Indiana

But she is young. She's just beginning high school. She won't be old enough to vote in a presidential election until 2004. She won't be able to run for president until 2020. And she won't become eligible for Social Security until . . . let's just say there's a good chance of pageants on other planets by that time.

Ms. Byers won her title while competing "at large," and her hometown, Newburgh, is a kind of mini-crossroads of Middle America. "It's in Indiana, it's on the Ohio River, and I can see Kentucky from my back yard." She also likes Florida, the state where she was crowned, and she's thinking of attending college there. But she has a few years to take up her mind for sure.

And then there's that beguiling face. You could almost swear you've seen Laurie Byers somewhere before. Many people tell her she resembles the TV character Ally McBeal, played by the waif-like Calista Flockhart.

But Ms. Byers is much more mature, more real, than any TV sitcom character. We asked her whether being America's Perfect Teen had changed her life, and she chuckled before giving a very thoughtful answer. "It hasn't changed my -- well, maybe it has changed my life, but it hasn't changed me."

And that's just fine with us.