Valentine for Natalie
by Jonathan Potter

Mon amour
St. Valentine
Opened the Door
And let us in
To be alive
With love and skin
Not just survive
But drink the wine
Of you and me
And eat the bread
Of mystery
And so to bed
To make such love
The angels gather up above.


Jonathan Potter, “Valentine for Natalie” from Tulips for Elsie. Published by Korrektiv Press, © Jonathan Potter. Used by permission. (buy now)

On this day in 1921, one hundred years ago today, the first Miss America Pageant was held in Atlantic City, New Jersey — an effort by local businessmen to extend the tourism season past Labor Day.

Sixteen-year-old Margaret Gorman was crowned the “Golden Mermaid” the following day for being “the most beautiful bathing girl in America.” The New York Times wrote, “Margaret Gorman represents the type of womanhood America needs: strong, red-blooded, able to shoulder the responsibilities of homemaking and motherhood. It is in her type that the hope of the country rests.” In the 1960s the event began to spark protests.

Feminist groups and those critical of the lack of non-white women in the contest picketed the Atlantic City Convention Center in 1968. They waved signs with slogans like, “Miss America is Alive and Well — in Harlem,” and “Welcome to the Cattle Auction.” In time the emphasis on physical beauty was officially downplayed, though the swimsuit component of the competition remained until 2018.

 On this day in 1860 Anna Mary Robertson, the painter known as Grandma Moses, was born in Greenwich, New York. She didn’t take up painting until her sister suggested she try it at age 77. She submitted a number of her canvases to the county fair along with her canned jams; the preserves won but the pictures didn’t. But a Manhattan collector spotted her paintings in the window of a Hoosick Falls, N.Y., hardware store and bought them all. He arranged for a gallery to show her work and, in 1940, Grandma Moses’ quaint, primitive scenes became a hit.

She died at age 101 having made fifteen hundred paintings, some of which are in the Art Institute of Chicago and the Metropolitan Museum in New York. Hallmark bought the rights to the images and her original works have sold for as much as a million dollars.

 Be well, do good work, and keep in touch.^®

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