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Such a
sweet idea

Photos by Joe Whiteko / PNB

Andrea Bailey remembers the first time she ever heard of the National Sweetheart Pageant. It was about one second after she became eligible to compete in it.

"Osjha Anderson had just been crowned Miss Georgia, and I was first runner-up. She told me, 'Now you can go to Sweetheart!' I didn't know what she was talking about." A little more than two months later, on Sept. 5, Ms. Bailey won the Sweetheart crown.

Perhaps no major American pageant is so little known to the public as National Sweetheart, but few pageants are so deserving of attention. It's a durable success story, founded on the unselfishness of one small town.

The friendly farming community of Hoopeston, Illinois, has been the home of the National Sweetcorn Festival since early in the 20th century. For the first few decades of this annual September extravaganza, the highlight was the Miss National Sweetcorn Pageant, for local girls. But in the 1940s, the concept changed. The town decided to invite first runners-up from Miss America state preliminaries to compete, and it changed the pageant's name to Miss National Sweetheart. A state's second runner-up could participate if the first runner-up declined.

It was an inspired idea. Being a runner-up is a uniquely uncertain feeling, somewhere between pride and disappointment. Hoopeston, so far from the bright lights of Atlantic City, offered these accomplished young women more honors, more opportunities and more scholarship money.

National Sweetheart is Miss America's charming country cousin, but the two pageants have no official connection. Unlike Miss America, the contest in Hoopeston spends little on publicity. And it makes few demands on winners, beside having them preside over the festival.

The town doesn't even ask winners to come back and crown their successors, says Ms. Bailey. "Sometimes, Miss National Sweetheart wins her state crown the next year, and she's already competing at the Miss America Pageant by the time her reign ends. So Miss Hoopeston crowns the new winner." Several Miss Americas and numerous state titleholders have been Sweetheart winners. Ms. Bailey could join that group: She has already won a spot in the 2000 Miss Georgia Pageant.

If you're ever in Hoopeston, and you're a person who likes to talk about the positive side of pageantry, remember to thank the local folks for what they're doing. And don't forget to sample their sweetcorn.

Showing our own agricultural ignorance, we asked Ms. Bailey what sweetcorn is. Some kind of dessert vegetable, perhaps? "No," she said with a laugh, "it tastes just like corn. To me, it's corn." But it's the best corn you ever tasted.

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