The Miss Chinatown 1955 Pageant program pamphlet, Courtesy of Douglas J. Chu, Museum of Chinese in America (MOCA) Collection.
1955年华埠小姐竞选节目单，Douglas J. Chu捐赠，美国华人博物馆（MOCA）馆藏

Local pageants have long offered a way for ethnic groups marginalized by the American white majority to celebrate their beauty and culture. At a Fourth of July picnic in 1948, a San Francisco Chinese organization held what was possibly the first Miss Chinatown “bathing beauty” pageant. By 1953, the San Francisco Chinese Chamber of Commerce combined the popular event with the annual Lunar New Year festival, expanding the event nationally in 1953.

Miss Chinatown USA continues to be the longest running Chinese-American pageant, and every year cities across the country send candidates to compete in qipaos in place of evening gowns and display a range of talents including traditional Chinese musical art forms. The above program for New York’s unaffiliated 1955 Miss Chinatown pageant demonstrates the practice of local businesses sponsoring candidates, such as Miss Wing Furniture Co. and Miss Chinese Hand Laundry Association.