By John Gray

The McConnell Center, the Porter Scholar Society and the Student Activities Board presented University of Louisville students with the Miss America pageant Saturday evening at the Floyd Theater live from Atlantic City. The viewing was free of charge and was intended to show support for Monica Hardin, Miss Kentucky and a U of L sophomore.

Hardin is not only a McConnell Scholar for Political Leadership, but also a Harlan Scholar (which guarantees entrance into U of L’s Law School) and a Porter Scholar. She is currently out of school to fulfill her duties as Miss Kentucky but will return to U of L next year.

The idea of presenting the pageant to a large audience was started by Stacee Blackburn, a sophomore McConnell Scholar and business management major who is friends with Hardin. She said that she initially wanted to have friends gather in a dorm room to view the pageant, but then word spread.

“Monica made a big impact on a lot of people while she was here and we were really good friends, so a lot of people really wanted to come out and support her,” Blackburn said. The Student Activities Board soon became involved.

“I talked to Chris [Marlin] and Mary Ann [Vetter] at the SAB and they said Ôwe would like to do something to support her because she’s been really big on campus,’ so we got Floyd Theater to show it and tons of people to support us,” Blackburn said.

Marlin, Film Chair of the SAB and a junior finance major, said: “We were looking for a way to support Monica and this worked out.” Free access to the game room on the top floor of the Student Activities Center was included in the event.

Also covering the event at Floyd Theater was the Courier-Journal, Fox 41 and WHAS 11, the ABC affiliate which presented the event. The pageant began with host Tony Danza speaking of the reasoning behind not postponing the competition in light of the recent tragedies. He told the audience, “not to make less of the tragedy but to make more” and followed with the Pledge of Allegiance, which mustered not only crowd participation but a round of applause from both the Atlantic City crowd and the U of L students.

A short time into the program, the viewing audience got their first glimpse of Hardin in the uniform white evening gown, saying hello to the world for all of Kentucky, “the birthplace of champion Muhammad Ali.” Unfortunately, Hardin did not make the initial cut to 20 participants, leaving the crowd at home disappointed yet proud of her accomplishments.

“I was really surprised she didn’t make the first cut, but everyone at the university is very proud of what she’s done,” said freshman mechanical engineering major Robert Strojan. There’s absolutely no shame in her accomplishments.” Ultimately, the title of Miss America went to Katie Harman of Oregon; but it could be seen in the eyes of all the contestants that it was all done in good fun and they all knew that what they had accomplished was something special.