Carol Ann Browning, Miss Missouri of 1964, paid a visit to Jackson on Aug. 6, 1964, if the date on the negative sleeve is correct. I can’t believe that I don’t remember shooting this beautiful young woman. Click on any photo to make it larger.
I particularly like what’s happening in the background here: the expression on the guy on the right and the oblivious diner in the left who is dutifully sawing away at his meat.
Awed onlookers
The Cape County Courthouse in Jackson was located across the street from The Jackson Pioneer, the paper I was working for in 1964. I wonder if I saw these women gawking at the hubbub on the courthouse steps and went over to check it out or if I just banged off a frame on the way over to the event.
He has to be a politician
I don’t know who the fellow on the right is, but he has to be a politician (and, if the boy in front of him is his son, I bet he grew up to be a politician, too). Only a politician would mug the camera when he’s four feet away from Miss Missouri.
A story in the Oct. 8, 1999, Nevada Daily Mail said that Miss Browning, a former Miss Eastern Jackson County, was given a two-year college scholarship and the use of a new Oldsmobile for her travels. If every day was as full of grip and grins as this one, I’d say she earned every penny of it.
Larry Winburn won a bet and a date
The Daily Mail story said that Larry Winburn was taunted by a buddy who bet Larry couldn’t get a date with Miss Burns. Larry accepted the challenge and won the date, the bet and the girl. After the Miss America pageant was over, the two got married.
She helped her husband’s father raise greyhound dogs, became a substitute teacher, then served as vice president and president of Nevada’s Boatman’s Bank; in 1998, she left the bank to become an insurance representative and did accounting work at a Sear’s store co-owned with her husband.
Gave free shows behind dad’s hardware store
Miss Browning, her five sisters, two brothers and mother put on free musical shows on a platform behind her dad’s hardware store. They became so popular that they bought a bus and spent much of the summer months and weekends on the road performing.
Her dad, Eugene Browning, died June 5, 2010. His Lee’s Summit Tribune obituary mentioned that the had partnered with Carol Ann, his first-born, to produce a book, Remembering the Browning Family Show – A Father’s Legacy in Photos and Philosophy.
The Pepsi logos on the car and poster leads me to guess the man mugging the camera (and by the car) is “Moon” Baker. Baker headed Baker Bottling Co., the Pepsi/Mtn. Dew/etc. distributor in this area circa 1964. I recall him driving the Pepsi car/boat into the Mississippi at the downtown waterfront around the mid-1960s.
Ken, I think you’re right. Pepsi was plastered all over everything connected with Miss Missouri’s visit, and I recall that Moon Baker was quite the promoter. That’s close enough to being a politician, I guess.
Also, the beamings smile and physique of the man is “Moon” Bakerish. “Built like a sewer lid,” as I have also been described.
I am sure that the two boys in the picture was Moon’s two sons. Bill Baker and the late Virgil Baker of whom was know as Bud Baker.Bill is till living and lives in Cape. His address is
William Baker
441 County Road 318
Cape Girardeau, Mo.63730
I am not sure that he has these pictures or not, but bet he would like to have them if he doesn’t. I do not know if they have a computer or not. I was working at Wards’ Big Star when his father was the Pepsi man. I remember him driving into the river, as he had taken our store Manager for one of them spins. He also had a jeep that had a canopy on top of it all in Pepsi logo.