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Bess Myerson (July 16, 1924 – December 14, 2014) was an American politician, model and television actress who was crowned Miss America in 1945. She became a city commissioner in 1969, beginning a prominent New York political career. In the late 1980s, her career ended amid personal and professional scandal. At the time of her death, Myerson was the only Jewish Miss America. She won the Miss America beauty pageant at a time when World War II had just ended. Her winning the title took on heightened significance in the immediate aftermath of the Holocaust, and was seen as an affirmation of the Jewish place in American life. At the time, she was seen as "a hero to the Jewish community".〔 Myerson biographer Susan Dworkin said that "In the Jewish community, she was the most famous pretty girl since Queen Esther."〔 Myerson was seen frequently on television during the 1950s and 1960s, and was a regular on the celebrity quiz show ''I've Got a Secret''. She was a commissioner in the New York City government in two administrations and ran unsuccessfully for the U.S. Senate from New York in 1980. Her career in the public eye ended in the late 1980s, when she and two other defendants were tried in federal court on bribery and conspiracy charges, in a highly publicized trial that ended with her acquittal.〔 ==Biography== Myerson was born in The Bronx, New York to Jewish parents Louis Myerson and Bella (née Podell), who were immigrants from Russia. Myerson's father worked as a housepainter, handyman, and carpenter. After Myerson's birth, the family moved from the South Bronx to Shalom Aleichem Houses, a cooperative apartment complex in the northern Bronx.〔〔(New York Historic Districts Council )〕〔Dworkin, 10-11〕 She had three siblings: a younger sister, Helen, an older sister, Sylvia, and a brother, Joseph, who died at the age of three before Myerson was born.〔〔Dworkin, pp. 10, 26〕 Her upbringing emphasized the importance of scholarship not physical beauty. In addition to tradesmen, her neighbors included poets, writers, and artists. Myerson reached her adult height when she was 12, towered over other children, and has said she felt "awkward and gawky" during her preadolescence. Myerson recalled one of her worst childhood memories was playing the Popeye character, Olive Oyl, in an elementary school play.〔Dworkin, p. 36〕〔 Myerson began studying piano when she was nine years old and was in the second class of New York's High School of Music and Art in 1937, graduating in 1941.〔Dworkin, p. 41〕 She went on to Hunter College, graduating with honors in 1945 with a Bachelor of Arts degree in music.〔〔〔(【引用サイトリンク】title=Jewish Women's Archive: Bess Myerson )〕 To support herself and her family while in college she gave piano lessons for fifty cents an hour, and worked as a music counselor at a girl's summer camp in Vermont.〔〔Dworkin, pp. 1, 57〕 抄文引用元・出典: フリー百科事典『 ウィキペディア（Wikipedia）』 ■ウィキペディアで「Bess Myerson」の詳細全文を読む スポンサード リンク
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