Press: There She Goes, Miss America

Vanessa Williams steps down, and the pageant lurches on

In our last chapter, reigning Miss America Vanessa Williams, a spirited 21 and going for the glory, got caught in some compromising positions. Ten of them, to be exact, to be published in Penthouse, a skin magazine with the luster of a no-wax floor. Officials of the Miss America Pageant, aghast, asked for her resignation. Williams said she would think about it over the weekend.

She met with lawyers, with family, with her flack. Last Monday, with a trace of hard dignity and without a tear, Vanessa Williams announced that she would step down....

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