from the 6/9 Pratt Tribune:
When Miss Augusta Emily Deaver woke up Saturday morning, she “had this feeling.”
The feeling might have come from figuring the odds. She had won three preliminay competitions — talent, swimsuit and evening gown. But no. The feeling was more than probabilities.
An excitement.
“I felt I really showed myself (to the judges),” she said later. “I think that’s what they were looking for.”
And when the judges agreed Saturday night at PCC’s Dennis Lesh Sports Arena, Emily Deaver, a 19-year-old jazz major at Wichita State University, became the first contestant since Angelea Busby in 2003 to be crowned Miss Kansas at her first appearance in the state pageant.
The judges threw her a curve early in the final competition, however. Deaver watched as contestant after contestant was called forward for the top 12.
“Everyone up there was amazing, just amazing,” she said. “And then they waited to the very end to call me and I just about died.”
Her confidence was restored after competing in swimsuit and making the Top 10. Following evening gown in her simple, black dress with its high collar, the field was narrowed to eight, and her name was again called last.
Then came talent, the event where her “soulful, smooth, deep chest” voice came into play along with her fingers as she accompanied herself on the piano.
Her selection, “What Are You Doing for the Rest of Your Life” was a song that she thought was “cheesey” at first. But it grew on her and on the judges — and the crowd.
“People keep talking about my singing. I don’t consider myself a singer,” she said. Nor does she consider herself a pianist. “I consider myself an artist. Singing and playing the piano are just tools to let out what’s inside.”
She breezed through the onstage question, noting that college students — if they were female — could enter a scholarship pageant to help ease the cost of their education.
The Top 8 lined up again when master of ceremonies Matt Mauro opened the judges’ final ballot. For the third time, Deaver listened to Mauro other contestants first. Once the four runners-up were named, she was left standing with three other contestants anyone of whom could have been the new Miss Kansas.
“I think in my heart I might have known, but I was nervous,” she remembered. “I was trying to stay in the moment and not just let it run away.”
As Miss Kansas, Deaver receives a $7,500 scholarship from the Peoples Bank and Miss Kansas Scholarship Foundation. She will spend the next year taking her platform — promoting the arts — to schools and public appearances across the state. She will also, of course, compete for the Miss America title.
(Read more about Deaver in the Tribune’s special Miss Kansas Wrap Up section.)
Next year’s Miss Kansas Pageant will likely feature all of this year’s runners-up. In post-pageant interviews each of young women said they planned to pursue the title again.
First Runner-up Miss Sedgwick County Danielle Coffman has competed three times at the state pageant, each time improving her peformance from the year before. She attributed her strong finish to the support of family and friends, and the extra steps the Miss Kansas organization took this year to prepare the contestants for achieving the crown.
“I said this in my interview (with the judges),” she said. “Last year, I wanted to be Miss Kansas. This year, I worked to be Miss Kansas.”
A 21-year-old Topeka resident, Coffman is a student at Washburn University. Her critical issue is advocating reading for life.
“Absolutely,” says Second Runner-up Miss Cheney Lake Alex Miller. “I absolutely will be back. You’re addicted (to competing). You can’t really not come back. The 18-year-old from Derby finished in the same spot last year — her first time at the Miss Kansas Pageant, collecting swimsuit and evening gown awards then. This year, she again won the evening gown preliminary. She is a sophomore at the University of Kansas.
Miss Wheat Capital Becki Ronen was a first-timer this year but nevertheless is steeped in pageant tradition. Five relatives have competed in the Miss Kansas Pageant in recent decades. Only her aunt Marilee Southworth has done better, finishing in the first runner-up position compared with Ronen’s third runner-up.
“Of all of them (family members) now I’m in second place,” she said.
A former Greensburg resident, the 19-year-old now calls Hutchinson home and is a student at Kansas State University.
Fellow newcomer Lauren Werhan will also be returning. The 18-year-old Miss Sunflower just graduated from Trinity Academy in Wichita.
“I didn’t really know what to expect,” she said when asked if she were surprised by her finish. “I just tried to do my best. I’m very happy right now.”
Saturday night’s finale was punctuated by rousing peformances by Miss Kansas 2007 Alyssa George, Miss Mississippi Kimberly Morgan, Miss Kansas 2006 Michelle Walthers Loss who reprised her comedic character Patty Pageant and J.C. Fisher who earned a standing ovation when he sang the Righteous Brothers’ “Unchained Melody” to longtime pageant supporter Bobbe Stanion.
