THE NEW PUBLICITY.

Taranaki Daily News, 22 December 1922, Page 7

THE NEW PUBLICITY.

AN UGLINESS CONTEST. Beauty contests have become quite a common feature these days, but a comnetjtion in ugliness gave an added touch of gaiety to the West End of London recently, states the Manchester Guardian. ‘Wanted,” ran an advertisement, “the Ugliest Woman in London. The woman who. in the opinion of the adjudicator, is the ugliest applicant will receive £lO at ‘The Ugliest Woman’ contest.” In leaponse to this advertisement, there was a surreptitious pilgrimage to the offices where the competition took place. Most of the applicants were shy, and east furtive glances from a convenient distance until a commissionaire encouraged them to enter the building. One of the first arrivals was a bedraggled woman with protruding teeth and scowling mien. She was brought to the studio by her courageous crosseyed husband, who. carrying a stout stick, and, mistaking a press representative for the adjudicator, bluntly asked in purest Cockney, “What abaht it?” On being informed that a necessary qualification for the prize was to sing a new song, which it was sought to popularise by means of tlip contest, the couple made a hasty exit, the woman oiaculating as she left. “Good gracious, T can’t sing for nuts.”

The next to enter was a merry party of girls from a neighboring tobacco factory. who. in turn, gave way to a demure and seriously-minded young woman of Jewish appearance. “I am a shorthand tvnist at present out of employment,” she stated in an interview, “and the money will come in very handy, as I have looked in vain for work’ for over five weeks.” She had noticed the advertisement in the paper,, and her mother, she laughing added, had advised her to apnlv for the prize, telling her she ought to stand a good (’hence of winning it. While the con + es<- wns *n progress a letter was received from the proprietor of a wax-works show at Hull Fair, offering the winner of the prize a week’s engagement to appear in his booth at the fair at a salary of £lO.