At one time, the August 1 weekend was the busiest weekend of the year. There were bean roasts, swimming competitions, potato sack races and just about anything else you could imagine.

     Some of the most prominent people from Ottawa came to party. The ladies dressed up with their sun hats and everyone made their way down to the beach.

     The highlight of the weekend was the Regatta and the Beauty Pageant. In between the speedboat races the girls would parade up and down a makeshift runway which was really an old hay wagon. It was all great fun! The pictures below were captured from a 16mm movie from the first pageant in 1952.

     The pictures below show some of the beautiful boats that were raced. Gerald Wilson was the winning racer with Cliff Jackson and Tommy Dolan presenting the trophy.

     There were three levels of competition in the Beauty Pageant - Queen, Princess and Duchess. There were no shortage of contestants. In documents that we have acquired for the 1972 Beauty Pageant there were a total of 80 contestants. Competitors came from as far away as Michigan

     The pictures below were taken from the 1972 issue of the Cottager - a local paper that covered current events. You can see by the pictures that the beaches were covered with people anxious to participate. It truly was the event of the year!

     This is an example of one of the boats that frequented, not only the Constance Bay Regatta, but toured all around the Valley competing in local races.

     These high speed boats ran between Constance Bay and Quyon. We understand that lots of boats failed to make the trip resulting in the ultimate shame - which was to have to be towed back to the Bay.

     This boat was proudly owned by George and Vera Barnes. We understand George had to work lots of overtime to support his hobby as can be seen in the name of the boat.

     These photos were of the Beauty Pageant that took place during "Bay Days" in 1980.

      The picture above includes Miss Kelly Long, the Princess and Kim Shipman who was the runner-up. The picture below includes the Duchess, Cheryl Catteral with the runner-up, Lisa Desjardins.



Long live the Queen! In the photo at left, Miss Roni Ennis accepts the role of Queen of the Bay from Miss Ottawa Valley. On her left, (top left photo) Anne Charron, a close runner-up.

       Roni and her family lived in Dearborn Michigan but came to the Bay every summer.

      Again, this beauty pageant was well attended and featured over 50 contestants.

     The last Beauty Pageant took place in 1988. While the event was still well attended, and there were no shortage of participants, it was no longer considered "politically correct".

       The last winner was Allison Shields, but sadly her name was never put on the trophy. In 2001, the trophy resurfaced. It was blackened with time but was eventually completely restored and presented to the community at a Valentine's event.

       In the photo above left, CBBCA President Len Russell presented the trophy to Allison along with Gwen White who competed in the original event in 1952.

      This is an 8 minute video that was taken in 1950 at the Bay Day's celebration. It includes film of the very popular Beauty Pageant as well as some of the boat races that took place during Bay Days. Tommy Dolan, Bill Jackson and many other "celebrities" are included in the video.

      A special thank you to Gwen White for helping me get a copy of this video. She confesses that she was one of the participants in the Beauty Pageant - but she won't tell me which of these attractive young ladies is her.