1970 PC students allowed to compete for Tournament of Roses queen for the first time.

As the new library reflected a new pride and respectability in the community, so did the college's new involvement with the Rose Parade. The Tournament of Roses had selected queens for its annual parade since 1888. Though Pasadena College students and faculty worked on the construction of floats and attended the parade, women students from the college could never compete for queen, despite requests from the tournament officials to do so, because the queen always reigned at the Annual Ball.

Lewis Shingler, successful Pasadena businessman and son of well-known Nazarene parents from George, became president of the Tournament of Roses for 1971. He obtained Billy Graham for the grand marshal and asked his good friend President Brown to let girls participate in the competition for Rose Queen. Brown explained why he couldn't--any association with the ball would violate the Nazarene ban on dancing and lead to cries of outrage from the church. If that was the only problem, Shingler explained, then he would make arrangements so a Nazarene girl chosen queen would not be connected with the ball. he did so, and the college emerged from the shadows of Pasadena's early life. In 1970, five PC girls entered the competition, four of them daughters of Nazarene pastors. Though none of the girls was selected queen, tow of them were selected into the Rose Court. Brown was seeking respectability for the college, and the participation of students in the Tournament of Roses was a second achievement, symbolizing the end of the isolationist impulse for so long a part of the Pasadena campus.

From For Zion's Sake, by Ron Kirkemo


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