Miss First Coast USA Report

Debonair Director Charles Lee with this new titleholders!

What a great pageant weekend it was as for the first time ever a Miss First Coast USA was presented. The First Coast is loosely defined as St. Augustine north to Jacksonville and celebrates the landing of Christopher Columbus and the first established settlement in America. The Jacksonville Airport Holiday Inn was the location as several of the Miss Florida USA family was there to support the pageant. It was so much fun seeing so many familiar faces!

Britten Simon (Miss Seminole County USA) and Melissa Wittek pose with pageant sponsor

and head of The Hollywood Office of Tourism Rozetta Radd (left)

Miss Florida Teen USA alumni Sara Long (Miss Sarasota Teen USA 2006) and Britten Simon

(Miss Seminole County USA 2006) catch up before the pageant (right)

First congratulation to winners Ashley Lauren Lake and Amy Ferguson on their outstanding stage presentations this weekend, they will be wonderful titleholders. This was truly one tough pageant as several of these young ladies will be seen competing again soon! Congratulations to The Debonair Pageant Staff and Volunteers for another outstanding pageant.

Miss Jacksonville MAO and Miss Florida Teen USA alumni Candace Cragg

with Miss Clearwater Teen USA Tess Wilensky during intermission.

Watching from the audience included past Miss Florida Teen USA alumni Candace Cragg (Miss Jacksonville MAO ’05); Mari Wilensky (FTUSA 1^st ru ’00 & FUSA T-15 ’03) and Sara Long (Miss Sarasota Teen USA ’06) who each looked outstanding. Mari little sister Tess Wilensky (Miss Clearwater Teen USA ’06) was there along with the entire Wilensky family. It was also great to see Jacksonville MAO director Kevin Sanders supporting the Duval pageant system.

Up next for this pageant reporter is a sea cruise pageant February 26^th as Port Everglades and Sea Escape host the 23^rd annual Miss Carnavale USA Pageant!

Miss Florida USA Starts Pre Taping

Pretape evening begins with Melissa Witek, Lindsey Shockey

(Miss Hollywood USA), Shenna Monnin (Miss Sarasota USA)

and Britten Simon (Miss Seminole County USA).

Can you believe it is already time to start the television production for this years Miss Florida USA Broadcast! The first adventure of the year was Thursday nights Wine and Design tour of downtown Hollywood. Contestants Lindsey Shockey (Miss Hollywood USA) Shenna Monnin (Miss Manatee County USA) and Britten Simon (Miss Seminole County) were featured on this strolling and shopping event. Miss Florida USA 2005 Melissa Witek serves as the television hostess in these segments dedicated to Hollywood lifestyles. As always our cameras were there so enjoy the pictures.

Lindsey Shockey delivers her lines at Valhalla on Harrison Street in Downtown Hollywood.

Kudos & Did You Knows

- Did You Know that this years Miss Universe Pageant, the world championship of pageantry will take place in the host country of Thailand and will be seen on NBC and Telemundo on Monday, May 30, 2005 at 9PM ET (delayed PT).

- Kudos to Pageant Sponsor Wish Boutique for the outstanding prize package presented to our Miss Florida USA Melissa Witek this past Wednesday. As always we have pictures!

Melissa poses with Wish Boutique owner Joanne during their shopping trip.She and Wish made quite the perfect match!

- Kudos goes to Melissa Witek herself this week as on Friday she is being honored at Leadership Brevard's Emerging Leader banquet where she’s one of the 12 finalists for their '4 Under 40' award. Great job Melissa and good luck!

This Weekend on The Pageant Calendar:

The Road to Hollywood takes a sea cruise February 26^th as Miami’s biggest annual Hispanic pageant Miss Carnavale adds the USA to it’s name! It’s a 7:30am boarding call for the day cruise on The Sea Escape out of Port Everglades. For those who like to combine cruising and pageantry there are still some tickets available, call Sea Cruise for more information.

Alumni News Wanted!

If you know of any Miss Florida USA alumni in the news please drop us an email to feature them in future articles. Email all info to info@missfloridausa.com! Until next week here to good pageantry!

PICTURE OF THE WEEK!

We love it when we find pictures that show our national titleholders as true role models.

This year picture of the week shows Miss Universe 2004 Jennifer Hawkins of Australia,

autographing a T-shirt during a visit to a cancer support center for children in Brasilia,

Brazil during Mardi Grass. Such a great role model!