Pageant

ATLANTIC CITY, N.J. -- When dawn broke yesterday over this jilted city in South Jersey, even the sea gulls shrieked their indignation. Locals en route to work and longtime tourists strolling the boardwalk muttered over that strumpet, Miss America, who after 84 good years was leaving them for God knows where. "It's unjust, it's unfair, and it's a horrible thing to do to Atlantic City," said Sondra Mitchell, a retiree who lives in town. "I know we put out money and money, millions -- millions!

In Howard County, it's not the acres, it's the attitude that makes a Miss Farm Bureau. Rebecca Hamilton, who has a garden, 10 beef cattle, sheep, swine, goats and chickens on 5 acres in Lisbon, was chosen over six other competitors this week for the title. She will represent the county at the Miss Maryland Agriculture Contest at the state fair on Aug. 26. She plans to let people know that while the types of farms in the county are changing, farming remains an important part of the economy and landscape.

Often stereotyped and written off as mere displays of beauty and charisma, pageants have been under much scrutiny throughout the years, but many are evolving to display a more dynamic side to women. The Miss Black USA Scholarship Pageant has emerged under the premise of scholarship, health and fitness to better recognize the accomplishments of African- American women. "Pageants in general have a negative stereotype; however, if your minds are open, ... you will see that these are average women that could be your mother, sister or daughter, all with one goal in mind and that is to advance themselves educationally, as well as to promote themselves with their talent," says Karen Lyew, executive director of pageant relations.

When Mo'Nique's Fat Chance airs Aug. 6 on the cable channel Oxygen, it will be sweet revenge for any woman who's ever been discriminated against for eating a Twinkie. Or outweighing one. The plus-size comedian put together the two-hour beauty pageant exclusively for women like her. "We had some girls show up who were a size 4," Mo'Nique said. "I said, `No, baby. That's next door.'" The 10 finalists included Tiffany Hall, 21, a student/librarian from Milledgeville, Ga. The pageant was taped Wednesday night, and Mo'Nique didn't disclose who won the title "Ms. F.A.T.

The Miss America Pageant, which got the hook from network television last year, has signed a deal with Country Music Television, a division of MTV Networks, for a pageant to be televised in January. That means that there will be no pageant from the boardwalk in Atlantic City, N.J., this fall, as there has been most Septembers since the 1920s, although no decision has been made as to where the broadcast will ultimately originate. CMT has headquarters in Nashville. With CMT, the pageant will get a potential audience of 79 million households, said Paul Villadolid, vice president of programming and development for CMT. He added that the network would also work to overcome one of the weaknesses of the old pageant format, which did not allow viewers to develop a sense of familiarity and partisanship with contestants over several days or weeks leading up to the pageant, as popular reality shows like Survivor and The Apprentice do. "Many of these young women come from areas that our audience cares about," he said.

The spectacle of 51 beauty queens slumbering in suburbia has long worn off, but the cost of keeping stalkers away from them has not. Howard County paid its police officers $42,333 in overtime to keep snoops at bay during late March and early April, and the Miss USA organization is not going to pay taxpayers back for it. The tab for 19 days of police escorts and round-the-clock security at the Sheraton Columbia hotel would more than cover the starting salary...

The worst moment of the pageant came soon after the teenager walked on stage: She flubbed the aerobic fitness routine. Ronke Olaleye was concentrating so much on smiling, on convincing the audience that she was "high energy," she says, that she forgot the steps she had rehearsed all week. Always resourceful, though, the 16-year- old improvised a few moves and rejoined the other contestants. She prayed her smile hid her disappointment - and shifted her remaining hopes into positive thoughts about her vocal performance.

Even as Donald Trump hovers like an overbearing fairy godmother around the newly crowned Miss USA 2005, who was spirited away yesterday to one of his New York lairs, the competition's spell has already begun to dissolve. Not only are the 50 other contenders likely disappointed, but so - in light of ratings released yesterday - are NBC executives. Enter the mouse-drawn pumpkin. The two-hour pageant, broadcast live from Baltimore's Hippodrome Theatre on Monday night, attracted about 8.1 million viewers, compared with 13 million last year, NBC said yesterday.

Front foot at 3 o'clock, back foot at 12. Shoulders back, chest out, hips under. Smile! Fifty-one beauties struck the classic pageant pose when Miss USA 2005 aired live on NBC last night from the Hippodrome and Miss North Carolina USA, Chelsea Cooley, a 21-year-old from Charlotte, was crowned. And in the background, the city of Baltimore - and the state of Maryland - didn't look so bad either, particularly to tourism officials who estimated the 12 or so minutes of pre-filmed footage of the contestants traipsing about was worth about $4 million in national publicity.

The white limo door opens like an oyster shell, and there, nestled in the leather of the back seat, is our pearl. Miss Virginia USA slides out, stands up, straightens. "Am I the first one?" Yes, Virginia - if you don't count the bomb-sniffing dogs that before dawn snuffled over the Sheraton Columbia, where you'll be staying the next few weeks, or the man-packed SUVs that have been circling the hotel at absurdly slow speeds, or the heaping fruit baskets, balloons and overburdened luggage carts that have streamed in throughout this March 25 morning.