Born 100 Years Ago Today: Bess Myerson, The First Jewish Miss America

When I first moved to NYC the big local scandal of the day was the Bess Mess, a bribery beef centered around the Commissioner of the NYC Department of Cultural Affairs, Bess Myerson (1924-2014). In the midst of it all, she was then arrested for shoplifting! By today’s standards the affair seemed quaint. She was ultimately acquitted of the bribery charges in a 1988 trial, the story quickly to become eclipsed by the Tompkins Square Riots. If the mishigas had happened just a few years later, I might have been very much more interested. When I started working as a fundraiser (and also an artist seeking funds), the DCA became an agency I was very much engaged with, but I hadn’t begun to learn the ropes yet at this early date. But something else about the woman somehow eluded me at the time that would have made me sit up and take notice: at that point she had been a national celebrity for decades.

Myerson’s years in show biz had been before my time, and that was why and how I had missed the memo. A working class Jewish girl from the Bronx, Myerson made history in 1945 by becoming the first Jewish Miss America. This was major. For just about all of its existence, even after Myerson’s milestone, the Miss America Pageant was a signifier of majority WASP culture, its aesthetics, and its hypocritical morality. But for some context on the year Myerson won, World War Two had just ended. Sympathy for Jews was at all time high. Israel was founded just a couple of years later. And Hollywood in the ’40s had glamorized New York and its working class outer boroughs. She was the gal for the moment.

Beyond this, Myerson was highly intelligent, witty, and talented. She had studied piano since she was nine years old, and had just gotten her music degree from Hunter College. She played selections from Grieg and George Gershwin in the talent portion of the pageant. As Miss America, her national tour involved piano recitals at major venues like Carnegie Hall. And just as she was passing off the baton to the next Miss America, television was coming onto the scene. And from the late 1940s through the late 1960s, she was a frequent presence on the new medium. This included several regular gigs. She was “The Lady in Mink”, modeling the grand prize on The Big Payoff from 1951 to 1959, and a panelist on the game showsThe Name’s the Same (1954), I’ve Got a Secret (1957-1968), To Tell the Truth (1963-67), and Match Game (1963-68). She subbed for Dave Garroway as host of The Today Show, and was one of the hosts of later Miss America pageants as well as the Tournament of Roses Parade. She also made frequent appearances on The Ed Sullivan Show,The Jackie Gleason Show, The Tonight Show with Jack Paar,Candid Camera, and many others.

In 1968 Myerson switched horses from show biz to local NYC politics, and this is why I had never heard of her before I moved to the city. In 1969 she became NYC’s first Commissioner of Consumer Affairs, a post she rated as someone who had hawked so many products for so many companies over the years. She served on several Presidential commissioners, and ran Ed Koch’s 1977 campaign for Mayor, elevating him to a national figure. In 1980 she ran for the U.S. Senate, but lost. She then served in the Koch administration, until the scandal. After which she retired from public life. Yes, boys and girls: once upon a time, some American public figures possessed a now unfashionable character trait called “shame”.

By my count, Bess Myerson is the fourth Miss America I have written about on Travalanche. Previous ones have included:

Fay Lanphier (1925)

Lee Meriwether (1955)

Vonda Kay Van Dyke (1965)

At some point, I will very likely also write about Phyllis George and Vanessa Williams.

Contestants in the Miss America pageant I have written about have included:

Katherine Grant

Thelma Todd

Joan Blondell

Anita Bryant

Carol Ohmart

Allison Hayes

Tricia Barnstable

Lois Nettleson

My post on the Miss America Pageant itself is here.

Epilogue: I don’t know if you follow such things, but since late 2017, the Miss America Pageant has undergone a new phase of scandals, upheavals, and reinventions. The fact that most people are unaware of it is a symptom of how low the franchise has fallen. I became aware of the current controversies because I observed the centennial of the pageant here in 2021. At one point I felt certain that the contest would wink out of existence entirely. This is, after all, the age of #metoo and revelations about Donald Trump leering at women in changing rooms (not to mention molesting some of them). But somehow the institution has managed to hang on. Those painted talons are dug in, baby! The official Miss America website is here.