Yolande Betbeze

Yolande Betbeze born 1930 in Mobile, Alabama was Miss America 1951.

Betbeze entered the Miss Alabama for the scholarship opportunities the pageant presented. Having been educated in a convent school, she was reluctant to pose in a swimsuit and refused to do so after she won the Miss America crown.

This controversy led the swim suit company, Catalina, to drop their sponsorship of the Miss America pageant and eventually brought about the creation of the rival Miss USA pageant.

It is claimed by the Miss America Organization that Betbeze's actions were pivotal in directing pageant progress towards recognizing intellect, values and leadership abilities, rather than focusing on beauty alone. From this time on the focus of the Miss America pageant changed from a beauty pageant to a scholarship pageant.

Betbeze was an opera singer, though she never gained a reputation in that area. She married the heir to the Fox motion pictures fortune and they had one daughter. Before marrying Matthew Fox she had dated Joe Dimaggio, and after Fox's death was romantically linked to Omar Sharif. She has been active in the feminist movement.

External links

*Yolande Betbeze's bio on the Miss America site