Scattered throughout campus are beauty queens, humbly walking among us and choosing to hide their crowns. In fact, some of the toughest, rough-and-tumble Hillsdale ladies don evening gowns and makeup to walk before the judges in their spare time.
Junior Veronica Wende has competed in 9 pageants this season and more than 40 in her lifetime. She entered her first pageant at age 5 and has earned between $3,000 and $4,000 in scholarships.
But Wende is not your average pageant girl.
“People are shocked when I tell them I do pageants,” Wende said. “People would never expect me to dress up. I have two sides. I am very athletic and outdoorsy, but then I have my pageant weekends where I glam up.”
Senior Olivia File has a similar style. She has competed in six pageants, but she describes herself as a tomboy that dresses like a girl.
“If you asked me if I wanted to go shopping or fishing, fishing would win times like 10 million,” she said. “I get tired of shopping within 10 minutes, and I would much rather watch football than The Bachelor. I’m the least girly girl ever.”
While some girls spend thousands of dollars on their dresses, File borrows most of hers from friends.
“The first dress I ever bought was for my first pageant,” she said. “I borrow all my dresses. I’ve bought one dress and used it twice. The most I’ve spent on a pageant for clothes and accessories was 50 bucks.”
Pageant girls are known for their poise and unfailing smiles, but maintaining that feminine air is a lot of work. Wende and File’s tomboy toughness comes in handy for what can be grueling preparation and pageant days. File said she said she spends more than 20 hours a week preparing the month before the pageant.
Smiling alone can be difficult. Sophomore Annie Tiegen won her first and only pageant her senior year of high school. Tiegen, a cheery girl with an easy laugh, said maintaining a smile for two days straight was almost too much even for her.
“My cheeks were literally trembling. They were shaking from the exertion,” she said. “You probably spend 8 hours smiling between rehearsals and the pageant.”
A typical pageant consists of a litany of events that give the women the opportunity to display their grace, beauty, intelligence, and talent. They perform an opening dance, showcase their particular talent, strut the stage in their swimsuit, do an interview backstage, answer a question on stage, and come out at the end in elegant evening wear.
But even experienced competitors can crack under pressure. Wende said that at one of her pageants she forgot her name on stage.
“I was doing an introduction and had this whole thing planned out,” she said. “I got to the end of it, and where I usually say ‘I am Veronica Wende,’ I just said ‘I am… uhh thank you.’”
All the hard work goes to what is most important: the girls’ opportunity to promote and raise money for the cause or charity of their choice. The entry fees for Miss America pageants go to Children’s Miracle Network. Every pageant competitor adopts a cause and helps out with it leading up to the pageant.
Freshman Amanda Tindall has competed in pageants for two years, and she raises money and awareness to fight sex trafficking.
“I want to raise $10,000 because there are 10,000 women in trafficking at any given time in the United States,” Tindall said. “For me it has been a wonderful experience that has boosted my confidence and that has given me an ability to represent a specific cause that I believe in in a powerful way.”
The philanthropic side of pageants is usually forgotten by the media in lieu of more negative characteristics. Clearly, catty girls cheating and arguing garners ratings better than respectful girls raising money for charity, as shown by shows like TLC’s “Toddlers & Tiaras” and “Here Comes Honey Boo Boo.”
Hillsdale pageant participants admit that occasionally the darker side shows up at competition.
“I actually had a friend who had one of the moms rip her dress down the back on purpose,” Tindall said. “Her mom said ‘oh, honey, there is something on your dress,’ and then she leaned over and ripped it. The girl had to go back to change, and her score was lower because of that, so she actually lost because of that.”
Tindall and the others agree, though, that the majority of the girls are outstanding.
“One of the biggest reasons I have stuck with it for so long is because I was amazed at the genuineness of the girls,” File said. “A lot of the girls who were older when I was starting out were passionate about their platforms, and they were just genuinely nice girls. It was cool to see girls passionate about Christ outside of church and Hillsdale which I hadn’t seen a lot.”
File’s tomboy spirit is not the only way she stands out. While many girls default to musical or dancing talents, she performs a comedic dialogue that consistently draws laughter and applause.
“At least every time I’ve had one of the judges come up and say it was hilarious and that they didn’t expect it,” she said. “I could sing or dance, but I don’t like being the same as everybody. It’s boring.”
The girls’ stories testify that competing in pageants is life-changing.
“In general, I’m not anything that I was originally,” Wende said. “I really don’t know where I’d be without them.”
