Kids with Crowns in News on Tour

We do parades in a very big way here at my station. This year we also expanded our News on Tour to get out in the cities and do the news live....Here we are from the Tater Daze festival looking all inspirational and windblown:

I had the fun job this year of interviewing the kids in the crowns, who supplied us with some fun trivia. They don't do beauty pageants up here, which is downright sad. After all, what's a festival without a queen? Who wouldn't want to be Miss Tater Daze? or Miss Whiz Bang? or Miss Frolics? or Miss Duk Duk?

It could be worse, as any southerner knows. Somewhere, there is a Miss Poke Salad, Miss Red bud, Miss Pine Tree, and I even judged a Miss Easter pageant once.




Instead, the crown wearers here are generally kids in elementary school who go to a series of picnics with officials and are quizzed on their city and their event. A group of 5-10 kids are picked to wear matching dresses and a crown (or a suit and a hat if they are boys) and go to city ribbon cuttings and other city parades. The kids in Brooklyn Park ride on a giant baked potato in several area parades.

I interviewed them on camera and the entire batch did rather well, even though they were disappointed their reigns were ending the following day.