Fifty-five years ago, Imogene Allen, now Imogene Erickson, came to Vicksburg to pass along her coveted crown and the title of Miss Mississippi. Tonight she’ll be back in Vicksburg, celebrating the anniversary of her reign.

“I wanted to be in the parade, but it’s too hot for that,” said the 74-year-old Yazoo City resident who represented that city in the last Miss Mississippi pageant in Biloxi. “The whole week is just so fun.”

Erickson won her Miss Mississippi crown in 1957. In 1958, she passed on her title to Mary Ann Mobley of Brandon, later that year crowned the state’s first Miss America.

Mobley had been first runner-up when Allen was crowned.

“She was so wonderful,” Erickson said this week by phone from her Yazoo City home. “I was in Vicksburg the whole week when I crowned her and we had so much fun.”

Phylis Sultan, a Cleveland native who later moved to Vicksburg and married Richard Cowart, also was a contestant in the 1957 pageant with Mobley and Allen.

“I remember both of them,” Cowart said. “Every one of the girls was lovely to each other, and I think it’s stayed that way.”

For the talent portion of the competition, Allen chose to showcase her dancing and art skills.

“Her talent is what I remember about her,” Cowart said. “She was very good, and she would draw and kick her leg really high.”

Imogene Allen was a 19-year-old student at Mississippi State College for Women at the time of the pageant, and this week said she never expected to win.

“I was so surprised,” Erickson said. “I couldn’t believe when I won.”

She said the biggest change she’s noticed in the Miss Mississippi pageant is in the swimsuit competition.

“We had the pretty evening gowns, but we wore one-piece swimsuits,” Erickson said. “And we really didn’t exercise that much. I walked home from school, that was my exercise.”

Erickson said though she made appearances as Miss Mississippi, she wasn’t as busy as the winners are today.

“My daddy carried mearound; he was my chaperone,” Erickson said. “My teachers gave me an excuse with what I had to do, but it wasn’t a lot.”

Cowart agreed that Miss Mississippi pageant has seen some changes and she can’t believe Vicksburg has seen 55 years of the annual four-night show.

“There has always been such great support here in Vicksburg for it,” she said.

Since she was Miss Mississippi, Erickson has raised four children with her late husband and high school sweetheart, John Erickson. But, she said, she keeps up with the pageant every year. “It’s changed so much, but you’ve got to keep up with the times, I’ve got to keep up with the times,” Erickson said.