Junnie Cross is a beauty queen from Magnolia

Magnolia, Delaware

Magnolia is a town in Kent County, Delaware, United States. It is part of the Dover, Delaware Metropolitan Statistical Area. The population was 225 at the 2010 census.-Geography:Magnolia is located at ....

, Delaware

Delaware

Delaware is a U.S. state located on the Atlantic Coast in the Mid-Atlantic region of the United States. It is bordered to the south and west by Maryland, and to the north by Pennsylvania...

 who was Miss Delaware

Miss Delaware

The Miss Delaware competition is the pageant that selects the representative of Delaware in the Miss America pageant. The event takes place annually in the month of June and is currently held in the state capital of Dover, Delaware at the Dover Downs Hotel and Casino...

 2000.

She is the first Miss Delaware of Asian descent (Junnie is French, English, Irish, and Korean) Before being awarded the title of Miss Delaware 2000 Junnie held the local titles, Miss Dover 1997, Miss Brandywine 1999, and Miss Hockessin, 2000. She earned several awards at the 2000 Miss Delaware Scholarship Pageant including, the Preliminary Talent Award, the Preliminary Interview Award, and the Miss Delaware Community Service Award for her work with her platform, Parkinson's Disease

Parkinson's disease

Parkinson's disease is a degenerative disorder of the central nervous system...

 Awareness.

At the 2001 Miss America Pageant, where Angela Perez Baraquio

Angela Perez Baraquio

Angela Perez Baraquio Grey , known professionally by her birth name of Angela Perez Baraquio, was crowned Miss America 2001 on October 14, 2000 in Atlantic City, New Jersey, becoming the first Asian American and first teacher ever to win the pageant. She participated in the pageant as Miss Hawaii...

 was awarded the title of Miss America 2001, Junnie garnered many awards such as the Preliminary Talent Award for her rendition of "Wishing You Were Somehow Here Again" from the musical The Phantom of the Opera

The Phantom of the Opera (1986 musical)

The Phantom of the Opera is a musical by Andrew Lloyd Webber, based on the French novel Le Fantôme de l'Opéra by Gaston Leroux.The music was composed by Lloyd Webber, and most lyrics were written by Charles Hart, with additional lyrics by Richard Stilgoe. Alan Jay Lerner was an early collaborator,...

. She also earned the Bert Parks Non-Finalist Talent Award and the Bernie Wayne Scholarship for Performing Arts. She was also one of eight finalists for the Miss America Quality of Life Award.

Junnie holds a degree in Communications from the University of Delaware

University of Delaware

The university is organized into seven colleges:* College of Agriculture and Natural Resources* College of Arts and Sciences* Alfred Lerner College of Business and Economics* College of Earth, Ocean and Environment* College of Education and Human Development...

 and has judged the inaugural Delaware's Outstanding Teen Pageant and various other local and state pageants. She also served as a state judge for Miss Delaware 2007, Brittany Dempsey at the 2007 Miss Delaware Scholarship Pageant at Dover Downs

Dover Downs

Dover Downs Gaming & Entertainment ownes Dover Downs Hotel & Casino a hotel and casino that has a racing facility that holds harness horse racing on a track and NASCAR events on a concrete surface. The Sprint Cup track is now known as Dover International Speedway, and the Dover Downs name is...

Hotel Casino.