Old Missoula

Janet Raff – A Most Beautiful Girl

Western Montana’s Most Beautiful Girl Will Win a Prize of $50

Cash Prize Is Added To Reward For Girl Who Is Chosen Queen Of Missoula’s Great Carnival

Will Be in Addition to Honor of Presiding Over the Festivities in Garden City For Three Days.

Candidates Will Be Known Sunday

Contest Is Arousing Keen Interest in Eight Western Montana Counties. Each to Select a Princess.

In addition of enjoying the honor of presiding over the festivities of Missoula’s three-day Fourth of July celebration, the most beautiful woman in Western Montana, who now is being sought through The Missoulian, will be presented with a check for $50 for her assistance in making the big event a success.

Chairman Ray Small of the committee in charge of the beauty contest made this announcement last night. Later, Mr. Small said, the committee will be prepared to announce the prizes to be given to the Princesses from the other seven counties, who also will have an important part in the celebration.

Owing to the accident which caused destruction of a number of nominations for the beauty contest, announcement of the list of candidates will not be made until Sunday at which time the first ballot will be published in The Sunday Missoulian. Then the contest will take on renewed interest as the friends of the young ladies who have been nominated seek to keep them at the head of the list.

Interest Is Growing

Interest in the contest being conducted by The Missoulian to determine the most beautiful girl in each of the counties of Western Montana is received by the Contest Editor, and the number coming in during the first two days was so surprisingly large that it was decided to publish the first nominations in this morning’s issue of The Missoulian. However, the accidental destruction of a number of the filled-out nomination blanks caused this plan to be abandoned, and the first week’s list of candidates will be published in the next Sunday Missoulian. At the same time the first ballots will be found in the columns of The Missoulian, and from that time on the contest will be on in earnest.

Missoula county so far is ahead in the number of candidates nominated. This was expected as it will take more time for the outlying communities to send in their nominations. But the sections distant from Missoula are beginning to start candidacies in behalf of their favorites. Ravalli county is next to Missoula in the number of nominations, followed by Mineral and Flathead.

Cash Prize Attracts

New zest has been added to the contest by the announcement of a $50 tribute to the girl who becomes Queen of the Celebration and of the Carnival Court. Not only will a high honor be bestowed, but a financial reward also will be an inducement not to be disregarded.

Several of the candidates have received more than one nomination. One of the Missoula county contestants received her first nomination Monday. Yesterday three more blanks were received filled out with her name.

The first votes will be made Sunday, and will start coming to the Contest Editor Sunday evening and Monday. From next week until the close of the balloting the contest will be increasingly hot.

Already friends are out gathering promises, and within a week the flood will start.

https://www.newspapers.com/image/348722696

The Daily Missoulian – Saturday June 25, 1927

Janet Raff Is Named Missoula County Princess

Biggest Battle of Ballots in Eight Counties is Ended

Nearly Five Million Votes Are Cast for Leading Candidates for Members of Carnival Court in July.

Queen Will Be Selected Later

Garden City Winner Has Biggest Total of All, With Alberton’s Successful Entry Next in Amount.

The Missoula Fourth of July Celebration Western Montana Beauty contest, which started out to be a merry little affair in eight counties and then developed into the biggest battle of ballots that this part of the state has ever known, ended last night with the final checkup of candidates’ votes. It took two days of steady counting to go through the hundreds of thousands of clipped coupons and the task was one of the hardest that experienced tabulators have been up against in many months.

As a result of the contest these eight princesses will gather in Missoula a week from today and one of them will be chosen queen of the Fourth of July celebration, which starts next Saturday, July 2:

Missoula county – Miss Janet Raff of Missoula.

Ravalli county – Miss Gladys Brooks of Corvallis.

Lake county – Miss Mazie Lott of Ronan.

Sanders county – Miss Roberta Bras of Hot Springs.

Mineral county – Miss Aileen Poirier of Alberton.

Flathead county – Miss Florence Marigold of Kalispell.

Granite county – Miss Kathryn Lindstadt of Philipsburg.

Powell county – Miss Marie Kirwin of Deer Lodge.

Five Million Votes.

Close to 5,000,000 votes were cast for the successful young women and during the final day more ballots were received by the Contest Editor than for all the rest of the campaign. It was the veritable swamping of the force assigned to the duty of counting every ballot that delayed announcement of the winners until today. Several thousand ballots were received yesterday, but as none of the packages bore a postmark within the time limit set for the conclusion of the contest they were not counted. Fortunately none of them in any way would have changed a final result.

In Missoula county the battle was particularly strong on Wednesday. It was seen late Wednesday night when messengers began to arrive with bags filled with ballots that there likely would be a close contest between Miss Janet Raff and Miss Beatrice Darrow. The former had kept steady influx of votes moving to the ballot box in The Missoulian office each day and on the final day turned in a few more than 620,000. Miss Darrow’s supporters marked more than a million votes for her on Wednesday while the next amounts were voted for Miss Viola Gingras who finished third and Miss Marjorie Zeh who was fourth.

An Extended Campaign.

Miss Raff’s campaign was about as extended as it was possible to make it. Votes came to her not only from the immediate vicinity of Missoula but from numerous coast points where there are subscribers of The Missoulian. Another noticeable thing about the vote cast for her also was that close to a third of the total represented the smaller ballots published in the daily Missoulian. Incidentally Miss Raff received the highest vote cast for any candidate in the contest.

A Popular Girl.

Outside of Missoula the largest vote came from Mineral county where Miss Aileen Poirier of Alberton who evidently is a most popular young woman was one of the leading candidates from the start. Miss Poirier’s supporters made absolutely sure that she would be elected and cast for her the remarkable total of 650,000 or about 100,000 less than were cast for Miss Raff.

In Lake county where Miss Mazie Lott of Ronan was chosen, there threatened a big break on the final day when Miss Gladys Bibee of Polson, who had been trailing along in fourth position, suddenly showed up with packages of votes that totaled more than a hundred thousand. However, on two successive days Miss Lott had been credited with 78,000 and 48,000 and these with the last day’s total placed her in the lead. Miss Leon June Stephens of Ronan came third, closely followed by Miss Helen Lampe of Polson.

Start Is Delayed.

Ravalli county candidates received their strongest support on the final days. Had Miss Martha Jeffrey’s friends started sooner that young lady might have caused a different result. As it was, beginning the week with only a few more than a thousand votes she finished with 58,000 about 5,000 behind Miss Lita White, who was runner-up in Ravalli where the honor went to Miss Gladys Brooks of Corvallis.

Miss Bras Chosen.

Miss Evelyn Marsh of Hot Springs was second in Sanders county, where another Hot Springs girl, Miss Robinson Bras, was elected princess. Miss Jesse Middlemist of Dixon was another in this county who made a strong campaign.

There were no heavy campaigns conducted in Flathead county, where Miss Florence Marigold, a State University student, was elected, in Powell county, where Miss Marie Kirwin of Deer Lodge is the princess or in Granite county, where Miss Kathryn Lindstadt of Philipsburg was the winner.

While the contest was conducted by The Missoulian for the Missoula Fourth of July committee not a detail was overlooked to make it impartial in every way and the counting was accurately carried on by clerks experienced in tabulation. The vote was rechecked each day so that there was no chance for a possible error to be overlooked. Every ballot whether for 10 votes or 100 was counted separately.

Missoula County Candidates listed on June 12

Marge Ayers, Lolo

Nina Bachman, Missoula

Catherine Besancon, Missoula

Anna Brown, Missoula

Claudine Christy, Missoula

Beatrice Darrow, Missoula

Beulah Duncan, Missoula

Artie Finch, Missoula

Rita Moderie Flaherty, Missoula

Josephine Gariepy, Missoula

Viola Gingras, Missoula

Clara Griffin, Missoula

De Etta Jones, Missoula

Gwendolyn Marcyes, Missoula

Valerie Marion, Missoula

Leah Mattison, Missoula

Hildegarde Mertz, Missoula

Margaret Mix, Missoula

Edith Oase, Missoula

Wilma Olmstead, Missoula

Miriam McMullen, Missoula

Margaret Price, Missoula

Gertrude Pritchard, Missoula

Helen Putney, Missoula

Janet Raff, Missoula

Adelaide Rice, Missoula

Helen Splan, Missoula

Margery Stowe, Missoula

Montana Taylor, Missoula

Neva Thompson

Pearl Tremberth, Missoula

Grace Waylett, Missoula

Catherine Wilburn, Missoula

Margaret Williamson, Missoula

Jean Wigal, Missoula

Marjorie Zeh, Missoula

“Miss Raff has been employed by the Missoula Mercantile company for the last three years. She is a graduate of the Missoula county high school and has made her home in Missoula for about fourteen years. She is the daughter of Mr. and Mrs. Robert Raff of 403 South First street, west. Her father is employed by the Interstate Lumber company.”

July 24, 1927

– The Daily Missoulian

Thousands See Janet Raff Crowned Queen of the Celebration

Miss Janet Raff.

Photo Caption:

This is Miss Janet Raff, daughter of Mr. and Mrs. Robert Raff, 403 South First street, west, who was the unanimous choice of three out-of-town judges for Queen of the Carnival. The judges were W. S. Fezzy of Chicago, representative of the Cudahy company; E. P. Kelley of Great Falls, connected with the Mutual Benefit Life Insurance company, and Jack Huepere of Denver, representative of the Pennock & Ford Sales company.

In the interests of full disclosure, I knew Janet Raff (Alkire) very well. Her daughter, Janet Gilder of Butte, Monrtana, is my sister-in-law. Janet Raff married Floyd Alkire of Missoula and was the mother of three children, Robert, Janet, and Donald. She died in Missoula in 1971.

https://www.newspapers.com/image/348722487