A 23-year-old contestant from Brooklyn, New York, has won the title of Miss America beating out 13,000 original contestants including the pageant\u2019s first autistic contestant and a woman with Tourettes.<\/p>\nA 23-year-old contestant from Brooklyn, New York, has won the title of Miss America beating out 13,000 original contestants including the pageant\u2019s first autistic contestant and a woman with Tourettes.<\/p>\n
Mallory Hagan won the beauty pageant on Saturday night after tap dancing to James Brown\u2019s \u2018Get Up Off of That Thing\u2019 in Las Vegas and answering a question about whether armed guards belong in grade schools by saying we should not fight violence with violence.<\/p>\n
Hagan defeated Miss South Carolina Ali Rogers, who took second, and Miss Oklahoma Alicia Clifton, who finished third.<\/p>\n
Swarmed by hugs and smiles from the evening\u2019s 52 other contestants, Miss Hagan balanced an armful of long-stemmed roses below her dazzling silver crown, one she will keep for one year while additionally awarded with a $50,000 college scholarship.<\/p>\n
The former Fashion Institute of Technology student, whose platform was stopping child sexual abuse, hopes to use her scholarship money to obtain a degree in cosmetics and fragrance marketing according to her bio.<\/p>\n
But first she is expected to spend her title reign on a nationwide speaking tour and raising money for the Children\u2019s Miracle Network, the organization\u2019s official charity.<\/p>\n
Hagan defeated several other notable competitors who grabbed headlines this year because of their backstories.<\/p>\n
Miss District of Columbia, a close runner up on Saturday, plans to undergo a preventive double mastectomy to reduce her risk of breast cancer, which killed her mother and grandmother.<\/p>\n
\nMiss Montana, 18-year-old Alexis Wineman, was the pageant\u2019s first autistic contestant who advanced to the semi-finals by America\u2019s choice vote.<\/p>\n
\u2018The girl you\u2019re seeing right now is not the girl you would have seen 10 years ago,\u2019 Miss Wineman told ABC News. \u2018I have overcame a lot. I have overcome so many of my symptoms.\u2019<\/p>\n
Miss Iowa, Mariah Cary, who\u2019s also 18, has Tourette\u2019s syndrome after diagnosed at the age of eight after experiencing mild minor tics. Today she tours her state spreading awareness of the condition.<\/p>\n
\n\u2018I made a choice early in life, that I wanted to use my condition to empower other people, not just kids who have Tourette\u2019s, but anyone facing adversity of any kind,\u2019 according to Mount Mercy University\u2019s website.<\/p>\n
There was also Miss Maine, Molly Bouchard, who lost more than 50 pounds before winning her state crown.<\/p>\n
And finally Miss Puerto Rico, Kiaraliz Medina, who after twisting her ankle and fainting during the competition was forced to add a pair of crutches to her red swim suit.<\/p>\n
She introduced herself to the audience by saying: \u2018I\u2019m here to make the crutches look good.\u2019
\nThe 92nd Miss America annual show held this year at the Planet Hollywood Resort and Casino on the Las Vegas Strip is the culmination of a week of preliminary competitions and months of preparations for the titleholders from all 50 states plus the District of Columbia, Puerto Rico and the U.S. Virgin Islands.<\/p>\n
The pageant, which started as little more than an Atlantic City bathing suit revue, broke viewership records in its heyday and bills itself as one of the world\u2019s largest scholarships programs for women.<\/p>\n
But like other pageants, the show has struggled to stay relevant as national attitudes regarding women\u2019s rights and civil rights have changed.<\/p>\n
More recently, the rise of reality television has provided a superabundance of options for Americans interested in seeing attractive young people in competitive pursuits.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"
A 23-year-old contestant from Brooklyn, New York, has won the title of Miss America beating out 13,000 original contestants including the pageant\u2019s first autistic contestant and a woman with Tourettes. Mallory Hagan won the beauty pageant on Saturday night after tap dancing to James Brown\u2019s \u2018Get Up Off of That Thing\u2019 in Las Vegas and […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[688],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-180218","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","category-infotainment"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/nagalandpost.net\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/180218","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/nagalandpost.net\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/nagalandpost.net\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/nagalandpost.net\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/nagalandpost.net\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=180218"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/nagalandpost.net\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/180218\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/nagalandpost.net\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=180218"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/nagalandpost.net\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=180218"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/nagalandpost.net\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=180218"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}