YOU Magazine | 5
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Beauty pageants were the stuff of teenage girls’ dreams 40 years ago; Ashburton woman Carolyn Donaldson (nee Skilling) lived that dream. She shares her experience as a member of the last Miss New Zealand touring party with reporter Sue Newman.
sands was an impossible dream. The year before at her mother’s prompting she entered Timaru’s Holiday Queen competition. “She suggested I had a go in the contest to build up my confidence. I was fine with that because I didn’t have to wear a bathing costume. I was so skinny and self conscious, I was always being teased.” To Carolyn’s surprise, she won and came second in the festival’s Queen of the Carnival. The prize money went towards her first car, a 1952 Ford Prefect. What she hadn’t counted on was the Timaru win making her eligible for Miss Canterbury. And that meant parading not only in evening and street wear but also in a swimsuit. She was horrified. She placed third and settled back into a quiet life in Ashburton. The following year she decided to enter the Queen of the Carnival competition again and won, forgetting that would guarantee her entry to Miss Canterbury 1974. “I never gave it a thought until the organisers phoned. I told them I wouldn’t enter again. They kept calling back, I kept saying no, and I still don’t know why I changed my mind.” The big day loomed and with her parents, Carolyn headed to Christchurch for rehearsals and a disastrous date with the hairdresser. A quick wash and a borrowed hairdryers dispatched the “boofy” hairdo and she arrived at the Christchurch Town Hall with hair she could live with.
The contest passed in a blur interviews, rapid clothing changes and very sore feet from very high heels. The 14 young women then returned to the stage together to hear the results. “The drum roll played again and again…a sudden push into my back by one of the other contestants and in shock I stepped forward. I had just been crowned Miss Canterbury 1974. I was in a daze. Cameras were flashing, people wanted to talk to me and all I wanted to do was go back to the motel with my parents and try to make sense of what had happened.” That was the start of a hectic 12 month schedule that would see her leave her job as Hotel Ashburton receptionist to hit the road as part of the Miss New Zealand show and fulfilling a year’s worth of duties as Miss Canterbury. It was also the start of long hours of dressmaking for her mother, with contestants required to provide all clothing apart from their swimsuits. Five weeks of modelling contracts around Canterbury, Marlborough and Nelson were followed by the Auckland Easter Show and then a national tour. Life as a contestant was lived according to a strict set of rules – no men in the young women’s rooms, a high moral standard had to be maintained at all times and on their free days, if they left the hotel they had to check with their chaperones before leaving and on returning. At all times the girls had to wear makeup and
Above– And so it begins, winning Timaru’s Holiday Queen title as a 21-year-old was the first step for Carolyn Skilling on a journey that would see her crowned Miss Canterbury the following year to become a member of the Miss New Zealand road show.