Pageant Culture Parodied in Toledo

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TOLEDO — Wednesday night in Toledo was a time to be remembered for all the pomp and pageantry of a bold group of high school seniors showing an array of talents to the community.

But as 10 intrepid young men walked into the middle of the commons sans shirts at Toledo High School and tried to dance in sync to Taylor Swift’s “Shake It Off,” it became readily apparent that this wasn’t your normal beauty competition.

In fact, some of the evening’s proceedings could have been considered anything but eye-catching.

Ladies and gentlemen, welcome to the annual Mr. T Pageant, an event designed to lampoon pageant culture in a lighthearted manner while at the same time providing an evening’s worth of laughter and fun memories — or a photo and video album full of blackmail material, depending on how one decides to look at it.

“It’s just a no-holds-barred, whatever happens happens event,” Toledo High School Principal Martin Huffman, who served as one of the judges, laughed. “I gotta say if you don’t like it, you had just better look away.”

If the annual Miss Lewis County pageant focuses on the qualities of grace, style and beauty for young women across the region, the Mr. T event is its raucous antithesis for young men around the small but tight-knit Toledo community. Celebrating its fifth year, the pageant — named after the town it is held in, and not the 1980s pop culture icon bearing the same name — serves as a fundraiser for the school’s senior class while aiming to provide loads of laughter.

Ten boys in their final year of high school in Toledo — Grant McEwen, Arthur Coppernoll, Bryan Osborne, Forrest Wallace, Riley Bowen, Konner Crawford, Isaiah Johnson, Mason Gaul, Aaron Bratina and Logan Holbrook — all agreed to be a punchline for an evening, albeit for a good cause.

The program’s format was similar to actual pageants, including a “beachwear” portion, talent segment and a question and personality part. The participants, all who play at least one sport at Toledo High School, temporarily set aside their focused athletic personas and played to the crowd, with several inducing cringes throughout the crowd as they walked the commons blowing kisses to those present in shorts and beachwear that would normally be reserved for the opposite gender.

Mason Gaul flipped the script, wearing a muscle shirt and throwing out cans of Mountain Dew to the crowd as he high-fived and made his way across the commons.

The talent portion elicited the most laughter from the crowd, and rightfully so: Forrest Wallace tried his hand as a percussionist one-man band, seemingly accidentally dropping his bass drum afterward; Osborne brought a willing participant on stage to serve as a panda for an “animal taming” show in which he tried to channel Steve Irwin; Coppernoll lip-synced to a George Strait song; and Gaul played a song he wrote to AC/DC’s “TNT” while pausing to chug from a can of Mountain Dew.



Perhaps the most stunning moment of the evening came from Logan Holbrook, who was the final contestant to appear on stage in the personality portion. Donning UGG boots, spandex pants and a bright shade of lipstick, Holbrook planted a kiss on the cheek of teacher and emcee Horst Malunat before waving and posing for a self portrait with his phone.

After much deliberation, the judges awarded Gaul the title of Mr. T, with 2014 winner Pascal House on hand to deliver the chain with a giant letter T that has become synonymous with the event. House set up a chair for Gaul, then promptly sat in his lap as fellow participants playfully mobbed the two and people in the audience took photos with their smartphones.

After the event, a reporter asked Gaul how many years of preparation went into the event. The man who penned many words that made the crowd laugh repeatedly elicited few in response to the question.

“.0001,” Gaul said as he admired the chain hanging around his neck.

A few feet away, Holbrook prepared to wipe the lipstick from his face as Malunat, still sporting the evidence, chatted with other participants in the event. The senior who recently took third in state in wrestling called Wednesday’s event one of the most fun events he participated in during his time at Toledo.

“The main goal was just to come out and make a lot of people laugh,” Holbrook said. “You know, it’s just for fun to be out here having a blast with my buddies. A lot of what we do is just spur of the moment.”

Organizers of the event said the evening’s activities drew more than 225 people to the commons — about one-third of the population of Toledo itself — to celebrate community and camaraderie. Toledo teacher Ronnie Gaul, one of the emcees of the event, helped institute the pageant as a fundraiser in 2010, and it has since become an evening that people look forward to much as they would a sports event just because of the laughs and unexpected twists that take place.

Generally, the event raises anywhere from $300 to $500 for the seniors’ trip after graduation, but it’s about much more than that, Gaul said.

“Why not just get out there and make fun of yourself for a couple bucks?” Gaul asked. “This is really the only time of the year, the downtime between sports seasons, when we can do this. We just all have a lot of fun together.”