Miss World 1970
Jennifer was born in St. George's, Grenada. She was 22 when she won the Miss World contest in December 1970 and so the more likely of the two dates of birth that are reported is 12 March 1948. She studied in London and then worked for the BBC's Caribbean radio service before becoming a flight attendant. The 1970 contest was held in London, United Kingdom. It began with a row because the organisers had allowed two entries from South Africa, one black, one white. Then during the evening there were protests by Women's Liberation activists and flour was thrown. The comedian, Bob Hope, was also heckled and scarcely raised a laugh. Even greater controversy then followed after the result was announced. Jennifer Hosten won and the black contestant from South Africa was placed second. The BBC and newspapers received numerous protests about the result and accusations of racism were made by all sides. Four of the nine judges had given first-place votes to Miss Sweden, while Miss Grenada received only two firsts, yet the Swedish entrant finished fourth. Furthermore the Prime Minister of Grenada, Sir Eric Gairy, was on the judging panel. Inevitably there were many accusations that the contest had been rigged. Some of the audience gathered in the street outside Royal Albert Hall after the contest and chanted "Swe-den, Swe-den". Four days later the organising director, Julia Morley, resigned because of the intense pressure from the newspapers. Years later Miss Sweden, Maj Christel Johansson, was reported as saying that she had been cheated out of the title. (In 1979 Eric Gairy was overthrown as Prime Minister because of corruption, favouritism and abuses of human rights.) Julia Morley's husband, Eric Morley, was the chairman of the company (Mecca) that owned the Miss World franchise. To disprove the accusations, Eric Morley put the judging panel's ballot cards on view and described the complex "majority vote system". These cards showed that Jennifer Hosten had more place markings in the 2nd, 3rd, 4th and 5th positions over Miss Sweden and the other five finalists. Julia Morley then resumed her job. However many still felt Sir Gairy on the judging panel had influenced the other judges to give Jennifer token placings. After her reign, Jennifer joined Bob Hope on his annual tour to U.S. forces overseas and made numerous other personal appearances all over the world with quiet dignity despite the controversy surrounding her victory. Jennifer then worked with Air Canada in customer relations, and married one of the airline’s executives, David Craig. They lived in Bermuda until 1973, when they moved to Ontario, Canada. Hosten gained a Masters of Arts in Political Science and International Relations from Carleton University, Ottawa. She has two children, a daughter: Sophia Craig, and son: Beau Craig. Jennifer Hosten Craig was High Commissioner to Canada from Grenada from 1978 to 1981. In 1998 she served as Technical Adviser on Trade to the Organization of Eastern Caribbean States (OECS) while living on the island of St. Lucia. More recently she worked as a Canadian diplomat (Aid Division) at the Canadian High Commission in Dhaka, Bangladesh before returning to the Caribbean. She published an academic study Jennifer Hosten Craig (1992). The Effect of a North American Free Trade Agreement on the Commonwealth Caribbean. Edwin Mellen Press. With her second husband, Shaun Sarsfield, Jennifer Hosten opened Jenny's Place; their tourist apartments, restaurant and bar on Grand Anse beach in Grenada in August 2005. In late 2006, Jennifer was appointed the National Director of the Miss Grenada World Contest. The event will take place on March 31, 2007, and will chose only the third Grenadian woman in history to compete at the Miss World finals.
1970's Femenists Attack The Pageant
When Miss World held its first competition of the new decade, the feminist movement's second wave was just reaching high tide. Popular magazines had declared 1970 to be the "Year of Women's Liberation."
Protest against the Miss World competition prior to 1970 had been in the form of small-scale actions easily contained. But when comedian Bob Hope stepped onto the stage of Royal Albert Hall in London to host the competition that year, he was bombarded by protestors hurling smoke and flour bombs. Feminists declared the protest a triumph. It became one of a handful of demonstrations in the early seventies that many believed strengthened the feminist movement in Britain. Five years later, women's rights supporters in Britain succeeded in winning passage of the Sex Discrimination Act and Equal Opportunities Act.
The revolt by feminists also inspired the founding of the Alternative Miss World Competition, a kitschy spoof in which drag queens competed with one another. And through the years, pageant protestors' tactics became more militant with feminists staging counter demonstrations, including events at which women dressed in gowns made of raw steaks, bologna and hot links. In the following decade, one activist even infiltrated a U.S. competition as a contestant, unfurling onstage a silk scarf that read "Pageants Hurt All Women."
The competition weathered other political controversy as well. A United Nations boycott was organized in 1977 because of participation by the apartheid government of South Africa. The U.N. dropped the boycott after the country pulled out the following year.
And Miss World contestants continued to suffer the personal indignities of the sort that had surfaced in the 1960s. Four months after United States delegate Marjorie Wallace was crowned Miss World in 1973, she was dethroned for dating too many high-profile men. A year later, Helen Morgan, Miss United Kingdom, relinquished her crown just four days after it was revealed she was a single mother.
Despite a decade of notoriety, by the end of the 1970s, the number of countries sending delegates to compete for Miss World had more than doubled, and the competition's worldwide audience had grown to more than 300 million viewers.
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