Fiona Gardner collection

The Miss Subways contest was a virtual quasi-beauty contest held monthly or bimonthly from 1941-1976, featuring attractive female New Yorkers whose appearance and personalities aspired to represent the values of the city and typify the stylish ridership of public transit services of the era, while maintaining a “wholesome,” “girl-next-door” quality not often prioritized in beauty contests of broader scope. The initiative was seen as progressive at the time for featuring accomplished and educated urban women of diverse backgrounds and experiencing a level of independence that was still perceived as innovative. Miss Subways contestants were typically shown on car cards that ran on regular revenue service, often comprising a black-and-white headshot accompanied by brief descriptive blurbs on a contestant’s occupation, hobbies, and interests. Initially run by the modeling agency headed by John Robert Powers, the contest was conducted by the New York Subways Advertising Company after 1961. Under the leadership of Walter O’Malley, that body conferred the charge of selecting winners to the general public, who could call their votes in after assessing the contestants insofar as they were portrayed in the car cards seen in the system. The program was briefly re-introduced in 2004 when MTA and the New York Post collaborated on a Ms. Subways contest.

Fiona Gardner became interested in the Miss Subways contest after working on the piece See You on the E Train, an earlier collaboration with New York-based journalist Amy Zimmer. The feature’s 2007 publication in the New York Times inspired Gardner to track down surviving contestants, capture their portraits, and record their reflections and personal histories. This project ultimately led to the production of the full-color book, Meet Miss Subways: New York’s Beauty Queens, 1941-1976. Featuring text by Zimmer and photographs by Gardner, with an introductory essay by historian Kathy Lee Peiss, the work delves into the origins, facets, and outcomes of the contest. After it was published by Seapoint Books 2012, the work was highlighted by an exhibition at the New York Transit Museum featured from October 2012 to June 2013, which explored the contest visually via the artifacts it generated, and shared the reflections and aftermaths of the surviving contestants who were successfully tracked down for the making of the book.