Julie Smith West is an American

beauty pageant A beauty pageant is a competition that has traditionally focused on judging and ranking the physical attributes of the contestants. Pageants have now evolved to include inner beauty, with criteria covering judging of personality, intelligence, ...

titleholder from

Birmingham, Alabama Birmingham ( ) is a city in the north central region of the U.S. state of Alabama. Birmingham is the seat of Jefferson County, Alabama's most populous county. As of the 2021 census estimates, Birmingham had a population of 197,575, down 1% fr ...

, who was named

Miss Alabama The Miss Alabama competition is the pageant that selects the representative for the state of Alabama in the annual Miss America Competition. Alabama has won three Miss America titles: Deidre Downs in 2005, Heather Whitestone (the first deaf w ...

1999.

Career

Smith won the title of Miss Lake Harding 1997. Her two sisters also won qualifying pageants that year and were among the 45 women competing to become

1997. Smith was crowned Miss Magic City 1998. She went on to tie for first place in the preliminary swimsuit competition then placed second runner-up at the 1998 Miss Alabama pageant. In 1999, Smith won the Miss Chattahoochee Valley title. Entering the 1999

pageant as one of 47 finalists, Smith's preliminary competition talent for Miss Alabama was playing the

marimba The marimba () is a musical instrument in the percussion family that consists of wooden bars that are struck by mallets. Below each bar is a resonator pipe that amplifies particular harmonics of its sound. Compared to the xylophone, the timbre ...

. Smith won the competition on Saturday, June 19, 1999, when she received her crown from outgoing Miss Alabama titleholder Ashley Halfman. Along with the title, she received a $10,000 scholarship and other prizes. On February 15, 2000, the Alabama Legislature passed a joint house resolution congratulating Smith on her victory, praising her breast cancer awareness work, and lauding her academic achievement. As Miss Alabama, her activities included public appearances across the state of Alabama, including speaking engagements and fashion shows. Smith was Alabama's representative at the Miss America 2000 pageant in Atlantic City, New Jersey. As part of the festivities surrounding the pageant, Smith participated in the traditional "Show Us Your Shoes Parade". Her competition talent was playing a medley of " Flight of the Bumblebee" and "

Csárdás Csárdás (, ; ), often seen as Czárdás, is a traditional Hungarian folk dance, the name derived from ' (old Hungarian term for roadside tavern and restaurant). It originated in Hungary and was popularized by bands in Hungary and neighboring l ...

" on the

. Smith was a top ten semi-finalist for the national title. Her reign as Miss Alabama continued until Jana Sanderson was crowned on June 17, 2000.

Personal life

Smith is a graduate of

Huffman High School Huffman High School (HHS) is a four-year public high school in Birmingham, Alabama. It is the largest of seven high schools in the Birmingham City School System and is a magnet school open to students from across the district. School colors are gr ...

. She graduated '' cum laude'' from Samford University in 1998 with a

bachelor's degree A bachelor's degree (from Middle Latin ''baccalaureus'') or baccalaureate (from Modern Latin ''baccalaureatus'') is an undergraduate academic degree awarded by colleges and universities upon completion of a course of study lasting three to six ...

broadcast journalism Broadcast journalism is the field of news and journals which are broadcast by electronic methods instead of the older methods, such as printed newspapers and posters. It works on radio (via air, cable, and Internet), television (via air, cable, ...

. Her father, Robert Smith, is a strategic planner. Her mother, Sharon Ingram Smith, is an administrator. She has younger sisters, Jennifer and Jill, who are identical twins. Smith was raised Southern Baptist. She and her husband, Rob West, live in Roswell, Georgia.

References

External links

* {{DEFAULTSORT:Smith, Julie 1970s births Living people American beauty pageant winners Miss Alabama winners Miss America 2000 delegates People from Birmingham, Alabama People from Roswell, Georgia Samford University alumni 20th-century American people