Miss Maryland

At the Miss U.S.A. pageant in March, Miss Maryland Megan Gunning took home the style award, given out by Clairol to "the delegate who best exemplifies a sense of personal style" -- meaning good hair, good clothes and good runway persona. It was no big surprise: Appearance is a big part of Gunning's world, and not just her own, either. The 22-year-old runs her own image-consulting business (called "Vis a Vis") from her hometown of Fallston and works as a hairstylist and makeup artist at Heaventouch Spa & Salon in Timonium.

Dorothy Laura Schulze, 83, artist, 1934 Miss Maryland Dorothy Laura Lucinda Schulze, a former Miss Maryland, artist and funeral home receptionist, died Saturday at Franklin Square Hospital Center from complications from a fall in her apartment at Oak Crest Village retirement community in Parkville. She was 83. Until she moved to the retirement community several years ago, Mrs. Schulze lived for 38 years on Ivy Hill Road in Cockeysville. She was a receptionist for 15 years at the Lemmon Funeral Home of Dulaney Valley, until retiring in 1995.

When James A. Narutowicz Jr. was growing up, he was often surrounded by beautiful girls. His sister, Anita, older by a year, competed in beauty pageants, and her friends were fixtures at the Narutowicz family's Towson home. Jimmy, as everyone calls him, was particularly struck by Mary Ann Cimino. "I thought she was gorgeous," he says. And he wasn't the only one. In her competition days growing up in Parkville, Mary Ann held a number of titles, including Miss Maryland Teen USA in 1990 and Miss Maryland USA in 1993.

Brandi Burkhardt's a Maryland girl, through and through.Born and raised in Pasadena, she's a 1997 honors graduate of Anne Arundel County's Chesapeake High School.She won the 1994 Miss Maryland T.E.E.N. and 1997 Maryland Teen U.S.A. pageants -- and she can only go a few months without steamed crabs.Now that's Maryland.But two weeks ago, when she made it to the Miss America Pageant, Brandi Burkhardt had a sash of a different stripe draped prominently across her slim figure. It said: "Miss New York."

Forget the big-haired, "My dream is for world peace"-burbling beauty contestant of yesterday. Keri Schrader, 23, the newly anointed Miss Maryland, is among a new breed of women storming the pageant circuit. Consider the Rockville native's vital stats: She's a third-year law student at prestigious Georgetown University. She can perform an entire ballet dance en pointe (meaning on her tiptoes -- ouch!). And, yes, she'll probably wear a bikini in the Miss America pageant in September.Before she heads off to Atlantic City, we helped the former Miss College Park practice her interview skills:What was the first pageant you ever competed in?

Megan Elizabeth Wisby of Eldersburg won the Miss Maryland Teen Pageant held May 1 at Anne Arundel Community College.Forty contestants competed in swimsuit, evening gown and interview.She will go to the national pageant, America's Perfect Teen, in July in Orlando, Fla.Megan, 17, is the daughter of Christine Wisby of Eldersburg and granddaughter of Robert and Mildred Herbert of Eldersburg. She is an honor student at Mount de Sales Academy in Catonsville.

It was father's intuitionA WEEK before that onslaught of heavily made-up women in bathing suits -- otherwise known as the Miss Maryland Pageant -- hit Hagerstown last week, a Severna Park father left this message on a reporter's voice mail at The Sun."My daughter's going to win the Miss Maryland pageant this weekend, and I need to announce a party we're throwing in the Giant parking lot for Sunday."Sure enough, Severna Park resident Heather Noelle Davis, 24, Park won.A fix?No, assures the father.

For Severna Park resident Heather Noelle Davis, the worst moment of the 1998 Miss Maryland pageant occurred when judges narrowed the pool of 22 contestants to five finalists. Four names were called, and Davis' wasn't among them."That was kind of nerve-racking," Davis, who competed as Miss Southern Maryland, said yesterday.But Davis, 23, was not only the fifth finalist, she went on to win the competition and $17,250 in scholarship money during the pageant Saturday night at Maryland Theatre in Hagerstown.

HAGERSTOWN -- The president of the board is hammering the edge of a temporary runway that juts out over the first few rows of the Maryland Theatre, preparing to swath it in a burgundy skirt and illuminate it with a string of white Christmas lights. The choreographer is rolling his eyes, belying the soothing "You will get this, you will get this" he is crooning, more to reassure himself than the 24 Misses splattered across the stage, some going right when he says left and others forgetting how to count to eight.

Tara Dawn Holland, the reigning Miss America, visited the Maryland Correctional Institution for Women in Jessup yesterday to promote an education program for inmates."