Erin O'Flaherty is an American
beauty pageant titleholder who held the title of
Miss Missouri in the
Miss America
Miss America is an annual competition that is open to women from the United States between the ages of 17 and 25. Originating in 1921 as a "bathing beauty revue", the contest is now judged on competitors' talent performances and interviews. As ...
2017 pageant. She is the first openly lesbian contestant to compete in Miss America.
Pageants
In 2013, she was crowned Miss
University of Central Florida. While there, she was an ambassador for Children's Miracle Network.
She took a couple years off from pageant competition, however, she wanted to compete before she surpassed the age eligibility.
In 2016, she was crowned
Miss Missouri in the
Miss America
Miss America is an annual competition that is open to women from the United States between the ages of 17 and 25. Originating in 1921 as a "bathing beauty revue", the contest is now judged on competitors' talent performances and interviews. As ...
pageant. Also in 2016, she became the first openly lesbian contestant to compete in Miss America.
Her platform is suicide prevention, a cause close to her heart from losing her best friend to suicide and experiencing her first funeral at the age of 13.
As an advocate for suicide prevention, she works with
The Trevor Project, a hotline for LGBT youth, and The American Foundation for Suicide Prevention. Her talent is a vocal performance.
Personal life
Erin O'Flaherty is originally from
Florence, South Carolina
Florence is a city in and the county seat of Florence County, South Carolina, United States. It lies at the intersection of Interstates 20 and 95 and is the eastern terminus of the former. It is the primary city within the Florence metropolit ...
.
O'Flaherty came out as gay when she was 18.
She attended the University of Central Florida, where she graduated with a bachelor's degree in accounting.
During an interview at UCF, O'Flaherty's dream job was to be a cashier as a child. She loved balancing her grandmother's checkbook every Sunday and was fascinated with the transaction process. As her strength for rules, organization, and numbers increased with her entrepreneurial drive, her dream of owning or operating a small business was created.
She currently lives in St. Louis, Missouri as th
Director of Operations for Captiva Marketing She enjoys world traveling, kayaking to see wildlife in Wekiwa Springs, and playing soccer. She also enjoys singing, which contributes to her talent in pageants.
In 2018, a short documentary was made about her life story called "Crowning Change" that premiered to audiences at film festivals around the world.
See also
*
Djuan Trent
References
American beauty pageant winners
American lesbian musicians
LGBT people from South Carolina
Living people
Miss America 2017 delegates
People from Florence, South Carolina
Year of birth missing (living people)
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