Miss Texarkana Pageant moves up date
A new set of winners will be crowned this Saturday instead of January 2018
The Miss Texarkana Twin Rivers Scholarship Pageant usually arrives in January in the midst of winter, but the crownings will come early this year.
The 2018 Miss Texarkana Twin Rivers will be held 6 p.m. Saturday at the Pleasant Grove High School Performing Arts Center. As well as a more advantageous earlier date for the pageant, it’s a new venue for this Miss America preliminary.
Donna Berry, executive director of Miss Texarkana Twin Rivers, says the scholarship organization will grant four titles this time, but the Texas-side Miss titles will be awarded in early January. They didn’t have enough contestants to enter for those titles, so they’ll move awarding them to the original pageant date, which is the day the Little Miss pageant will be held.
“We are going to crown Miss Texarkana Twin Rivers on the Arkansas side, Miss Texarkana Twin Rivers Outstanding Teen on the Arkansas side. We’re going to crown our two Texas teen titles: Miss Texarkana’s Outstanding Teen, and we’re going to crown Miss Twin Rivers Outstanding Teen,” Berry said of Saturday’s pageant.
That makes for four of the original six titles up for grabs Saturday.
Berry thinks holding a pageant at this time of year is a challenge.
“It looks like the date is bad because of college, the girls going back to school,” Berry said, explaining that Miss America’s rules dictate that four contestants must enter for a title to be awarded. That wasn’t achieved with the two Texas-side Miss titles.
In late July, the scholarship organization announced the date switch, citing financial considerations. Moving the location was going to make the pageant more affordable, Berry said then. Also, the Christmas holiday and winter weather were also factors.
Current titleholders are able to keep their titles until January, unless one of them competes in another pageant and wins another title, Berry explained.
As has been the case recently, the local young women will be the entertainment with their talents showcased on stage. Outgoing titleholders will perform, too, with their state pageant talents. Two dance groups from a Magnolia, Ark., studio will perform, one with hip-hop and the other with Broadway numbers.
“The theme is Make it Happen in 2018,” Berry said.
Admission is $15 with tickets sold at the door.
“We really want the community to come out and support the contestants that we have,” Berry said, noting as a nonprofit organization everything goes back to the scholarships or to the pageant event itself. “What we do is volunteer,” she said.
Once again, Michelle Parham Rudolph will emcee the pageant. “She can sing and bring the house down,” Berry said. “Her talents are amazing.”
With fewer contestants and titles this time around, expect a shorter pageant. “We’re going to try to make it fast-paced where crowning will be early,” Berry said, noting that local contestants can make it big starting on a small stage like this.
“We’ll try to make it a short, fun evening to support some amazing young ladies,” she said.
(On the Net: MissTexarkanaTwinRivers.org.)