MISS SA IN FULL COLOUR

In 1992, Amy Kleinhans became the first official Miss SA "of colour". Her runners-up were Augustine Masilela, Lisa King, Belinda Haw and Sasha-Lee Walton. Her win was the start of a change process for the Miss SA pageant since in the very next year, the first black Miss SA, Jacqui Mofokeng, was crowned.

The reality is, however, that in a perfect world, Amy would not have been the first Miss SA "of colour". Whilst the Miss SA pageant and nearly all local pageant archivists neglect to acknowledge the existence of a "black" Miss SA pageant, the truth is that the first official "black" Miss SA pageant started in 1955, the year before the first official "white" Miss SA pageant.

Given the poor quality of newspapers aimed at the black market back then, it has proven difficult to copy photographs to add to the archives on this blog. What I can report, however, is that, with the proper grooming and styling, a number of the winners and runners-up at the "black" Miss SA pageant, organised by the South African United Non-European Cultural Syndicate, would have given their "white" counterparts a serious run for their money had they been allowed to compete at the official Miss SA pageant.

Africa boycotted the 1976 Olympics, the USA led alliance boycotted the 1980 Olympics, and the Soviet bloc boycotted the 1984 Olympics. The result is that the official list of winners at those editions of the Olympics do not necessarily reflect the best in the world at the time. Only those who attended the games could win medals, so officially they were the best in the world.

Whilst the is a huge difference between being excluded and boycotting, the reality is that only those who participated will go down in history as the "best" for that year. Officially, Amy Kleinhans remains the first Miss SA "of colour".