First Miss Auburn recalls shining moment

As a young, idealistic and naive teenager, Ann Worden didn't expect much to happen when she stepped onto the bright stage in the spring of 1963.

As a young, idealistic and naive teenager, Ann Worden didn’t expect much to happen when she stepped onto the bright stage in the spring of 1963.

A beauty pageant wasn’t exactly a fitting court of play for an athletic, 18-year-old girl, who preferred swinging a swift tennis racket to moving gracefully in a chiffon dress.

But the congenial, pretty Auburn High School senior surprised everybody.

“I didn’t expect to win at all. I (signed up) to get out of a class,” Worden said with a smile, followed by a burst of laughter. “It was a real shock.

“No one ever expected me to do anything. I was just a ‘jock.'”

A jock with a competitive nature.

Matched against nine other contestants, Worden convinced the judges and wowed the audience to capture the crown at the Junior Chamber of Commerce Miss Auburn Pageant at Olympic Junior High School.

Worden officially became the first Miss Auburn, as recognized by a local program that reorganized and affiliated with the Miss America Scholarship Program in 1962. Since the fledgling 1960s, the pageant has grown in the number of contestants and scholarships awarded to become one of the largest in the state and among the most successful in the country.

The Miss Auburn Scholarship Pageant celebrates its 50th anniversary this weekend by crowning a new queen. A field of 22 contestants comprise the field. The finals are at 7 p.m. Saturday at the Auburn Performing Arts Center, 700 E. Main St.

As its inaugural winner, Worden is glad to be a part of its long, revered history.

“Fifty years?” she was told of the pageant that has persevered. “It’s an honor to belong to it.”

Looking back, Worden best remembers how she answered the question posed to each contestant.

“They asked, ‘What would you do if you were on a train and they lost all of your luggage?'” she recalled. “I said I would go out in the woods and get myself some leaves … get some bark and use them for my shoes and tie them with some grass. If anything else, I would just go natural.

“I think that’s why I won,” she said with a sheepish grin. “The judges were laughing their heads off.”

But Worden, an accomplished athlete and a member of the high school cheerleading squad, further boosted her chances by punctuating her snappy rendition of “The Charleston” – a popular dance of the 1920s – with an acrobatic flip.

For the pageant, Worden borrowed a dress. Rottles sponsored her.

Dennis Durr sat in the audience, cheering her on.

“I actually had no idea she would win,” said Durr, a 1961 Auburn High graduate. “But she was the best one there.”

Durr would later marry Worden. Longtime Auburnites, they have raised six children.

Two of Worden’s daughters, Julie and Jamie, would later participate as pageant chaperones. Worden would volunteer in various capacities for the pageant.

As Miss Auburn, Worden won a $200 scholarship that she applied to then-Western Washington College. She wanted to become a teacher, but those plans waned when she ran out of money in her second year at Bellingham.

She worked an assortment of jobs while raising her kids.

Worden grew up in a large family of modest means. They didn’t have much in terms of material things, she said, but they had plenty of everything else. She learned the importance of hard work, trust, love and understanding.

Today, Worden and her husband live the good, quiet life on the West Hill, tending to a large garden and big yard spread over more than an acre.

“She cares a lot for me, as I do for her,” Dennis said.

Fit and trim, sharp and funny, Worden keeps active while maintaining a simple, outgoing approach to life.

Make each day count.

And beauty is just as attractive and meaningful when it comes from within.

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2 queens, 1 night

• Event: Miss Auburn Scholarship Pageant, Miss Auburn Outstanding Teen Pageants (MAOT)

• Schedule: 7 p.m. Friday, Saturday (finals); 1-4 p.m. Saturday (MAOT only)

• Stage: Auburn Performing Arts Center, 700 E. Main St.

• Fields: 22 for Miss Auburn; 13 for Miss Auburn Teen

• Program: The program – produced by the Miss Auburn Scholarship Program Inc. and sponsored by the Auburn Noon Lions Club – is an official preliminary to the Miss Washington and Miss America Scholarship Pageants. People’s Choice Award to benefit the Auburn Food Bank.

• Tickets: $15-20 range, www.brownpapertickets.com. Individual Friday/Saturday tickets will be sold only at the door. MOAT tickets will be sold at the door on a first-come, first-served basis. Festival seating only.

• Donations: Donations to the Miss Auburn Scholarship Program can be sent to: Miss Auburn Scholarship Program, PMB #152, 1402 Auburn Way N., Auburn, WA 98002-3309. Individual donations can be made by visiting a contestant’s Web page to make a donation directly to the contestant of your choice. (PayPal)

• Information: www.missauburn.org