Editor’s note: This artilce by Jennifer Campbell is reprinted with permission from Whiteside News Sentinel; it ran Tuesday, February 24, 2015.
“The teachers voted as well as the students. There was a boy and myself that won the American Legion Award,” Barbara Austin began. In Morrison[, IL,] we all know her as “Sug.” Sug was given the nickname by her father who called her “Sugar.” Austin was awarded the American Legion Award in eighth grade, and her destiny propelled her success to continue.
“For graduation I got my diploma from my dad, because he was the President of the school board. That was really special,” Austin recalled. In high school Austin was voted the “Honey Bear” by her peers. She was a student at Pharr-San Juan-Alamo High School. The high school sports team was known as the “Bears.”
“I got a gold football necklace. The football captain was supposed to give me the award. This boy was so shy. It was almost painful. He was supposed to kiss me, and he was so shy he missed,” Austin said about receiving the “Honey Bear” award.
At a time when girls’ sports were given little attention, Austin was the first girl in her school to letter in two sports: tennis and track. She was also an exceptional baseball player and well-known for being a clean-up hitter. “In Texas, at that time, everything that was really important was football and beauty pagents,” Austin commented.
Austin was also in a play while in high school called “My Cousin from Texas.” “It was really fun. I was the cousin, and it was a secret. Nobody knew all through the play who the cousin from Texas was until the third act. And there I was,” she added about the play.
After graduation, Austin went to A & I University and pursued a degree in business. The first beauty pagent Austin entered was for Miss A & I. The second one was in Corpus Christi[, TX,] with the prize being a trip to New York[, NY]. A third pagent was in Matamoros, Mexico. After that she traveled to Waco, TX, where she was crowned Miss Texas.
Austin received sponsorship for each pagent. “I was interviewed a lot of times,” Austin remembered about the pagents. “I remember getting to go to a big party one evening. It was called Steel Pier. It was a rider and a horse that went up three stories….[T]he end of the act was the horse jumped off with the rider and jumped into the ocean. Scared me. I didn’t see very much of it, because I had my eyes covered,”
Austin recalled about being in Atlantic City. “I was sponsored by Lions Club International. That was girls from all over the world. It was bathing suit and formal wear. We were interviewed by a panel of judges. It happened when I won the contest in Corpus Christi. One of the prizes was a trip to New York for three days. I was really looking forward to seeing Yankee Stadium and the ball game.
My Mom and I had really good seats, but sitting behind me was a guy that wanted to talk, and he kept singing,” Austin reminisced. “He asked me if I would like to go out for dinner[, a]nd my mom said absolutely not. A little bit later, I noticed girls were asking this guy for an autograph[, a]nd so I did, too. He autographed the baseball program for me, and I still didn’t know who he was until later,” Austin continued.
And who was the admiring stranger? The stranger was Eddie Fisher. Fisher was a successful singer who sold millions of albums and had his own tv show. Perhaps Fisher is best known for being a husband of Elizabeth Taylor. “I should have told Elizabeth Taylor he was no prize,” Austin joked.
“My mom and I came home on the train. We had a grand time,” Austin said thoughtfully. “It’s been a long time since I thought about a lot of these things. I’m really happy that you asked me to do this. If I had to do it over again, I would have majored in physical education,” she said.
Austin had grandparents in Morrison and would travel to Morrison in her youth to visit. On one of her trips, she met her husband, Gail Austin. “It was a put-up job. My grandfather thought Gail was a pretty nice guy. He asked Gail if he would take me out when I was here,” Austin remembered. On one of their dates, she met Sam Snead, a professional golfer. Snead struck up a conversation with Austin. “He was probably a pretty nice man, even though he was kind of flirty. Being a country girl, I didn’t realize what things were like when an older man flirted with you,” Austin reminisced about Snead. “He was a nice man.”
Austin and her husband continued their long-distance youthful courtship. One year, Austin was invited to visit the family in Texas. He was there two weeks later with a ring.