The Chairman was still asleep as Christmas began to box up its various appurtenances for careful storage. Not that anyone was acting on it, except to tip our collective toppers to a marvelous holiday, and began to prepare for the next holiday with a somewhat harder edge, the birth of a New Year.
There were some hot spots in the world that the Writer’s Section was directed to monitor privately, while concentrating on issues with positive aspects to deflect some of the events of 2020. We will box them into another bin of mischief and attempt to deal with it later. When the great hand reaches down from the skies and rips the last page from the current calendar. Being still abed, there was no new guidance from the Chairman on how to deal with this handful of days before the change. We were lucky, though, since the search for non-polemic laden articles had produced some curious images that harked merriment across the American Century.
Splash was waving his device as some of the rest of us ambled down to the Fire Ring, coffee in hand. It was pleasant to be outside, squinting in the light of a fresh day under bottomless blue. “Lookit this! A lady who wrote an article about how nuts all this stuff is. She went to Princeton, but now is under assault by her alma mater for claiming that ‘XY’ people can’t just claim to be ‘XX’ people because they feel that way!”
The Seasonal reward for this holiday had produced temperatures in Virginia’s Piedmont that scraped 70 degrees on Christmas. The Lady in Red on the flatscreen had warned us not to get used to it, brimming with the sort of optimism appropriate (or not!) for the New Year coming. So, absent editorial direction from the Boss, we decided to look back. We had a picture from the Chairman’s past that we loved. It featured a woman named ‘Ay,’ an old-fashioned name that Mrs. Evelyn Margaret Sempier used for appearances after she won the 1954 Miss America Beauty Pageant.
DeMille provided the background. “She was born in 1933, a year that featured some difficulty in These United States. She was born of German immigrant stock in Ephrata, a little town in SE Pennsylvania, not far from the Chairman’s family in Shippensburg. It was a busy place in America’s growing years, though fairly quiet these days. She was made for greater things. She had a short but successful career in smaller beauty contests, including the Miss Ephrata Fair and a reign as Tobacco Queen of Lancaster County in 1950. Her crown was crafted to look like a wreath of tobacco leaves.”
He went on, not minding Splash’s distraction. “After graduating from high school in 1951, the year of the Chairman’s birth, she racked up victories as Miss Pennsylvania AMVET, then accelerating upward through the national AMVET championship in 1952. She left the veterans behind and in 1953, representing all beauty contestants to be crowned Miss Pennsylvania in 1953.” He took a sip of coffee and sat down, birds flying over the pastures with wild abandon.
“Her greatest triumph in 1954 was selection as Miss America, prettiest young lady in the nation. It was something people read about in their local papers, since it was the last year before the pageant became a televised event. None of us know if it is still televised, or who might be allowed to compete under our now uncertain eligibility criteria. Her name evolved over time, and she was known as “Evvy,” a no-kidding Beauty Queen. She was surprised at her career, and once said it was an ultimate role model, like being Doris Day in real life.”
DeMille was calm, and described what was next. “She embarked on a career to exploit her fame. She lent her name to a friend who was trying to promote a pageant for the Junior Chamber of Commerce- the JayCees. She estimated traveling 270,000 miles during her year-long reign as America’s Miss. She remained active with the pageant for many years, judging many local pageants and the national Miss America contest in 1981. Along the way, she had her own family, two kids and an ex-Navy husband. The family connection to the Boss is how her picture came to the Writer’s Section. At the height of her notoriety, Evvy officially introduced the Nash Metropolitan at the 1954 Chicago Auto Show. That was a moment in the Soctora family, too. The Chairman’s Dad was hired by George Romney at Nash-Kelvinator to work on specialized products that would appeal to a broader section of American consumers. Women.”
The Chairman himself appeared in an unusual morning ramble. He prefers to let creativity take its own hand, with specific guidance issued through Legal and HR to make it seem not personal preference from the Head Shed. This bright morning found him near the fire-pit looking at the pictures. “My Dad had one of these in the driveway. He taught my Mother how to drive in it. Not a great deal of difference with Evvy’s ride, except for the trunk where she is riding:”
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“We thought The Metropolitan was cool, and a real breakthrough. There was a problem, though. The bodies they bought from England didn’t have trunks like American cars. That meant the women had to unload the kids and leave them outside while they squirmed into the back to lower the inside lid. I remember him taking a rotary saw to the one we had to install his own, so Mom didn’t have to worm her way into the back seat. It was fun for us kids, watching him saw up a new car. Evvy described her marketing for Nash as the best in her 40-years of commercial relationships. I met her when Dad took me to one of the reunion car shows. In the ‘60s and ‘70s she made a living doing motivational speeches to business and women’s groups. Nice lady. Still trim, great posture and very nice. Courteous. She signed that picture for me.” Then he wandered off in the direction of the barn, where there were tall stacks of boxes to put the holiday stuff away.
DeMille took the queue from the Chairman, waiting until he was out of earshot. He stood, Evvy’s picture in hand and made a short Boxing Day address to the group. “The Evelyn Sempier Quality of Life Award was established in her honor. It recognizes Miss America contestants involved with the Children’s Miracle network or who excel in commitment to Community Service. I think we ought to run her life as a story for this week between holidays and include the car she promoted and which Dad designed to help women move forward.”
“No chromosome test, right?” asked Splash with a laugh. DeMille sat down again with a grin.
“No, there were some things back then that still made sense.”
Copyright 2021 Vic Socotra
www.vicsocotra.com