MEET LIBBY CRAWFORD

Founder & Executive Director

For Libby Crawford, pageantry was never really about the crown. It was about what you did while you had the opportunity to wear one. Her relationship with pageantry began as a teenager, long before she could have imagined that it would become a thread running through more than four decades of her life.

She has been the contestant standing backstage with butterflies in her stomach. The coach trying to settle someone else's nerves. The judge on the other side of the table. The state director watching a woman discover confidence she didn't know she had. And the executive working behind the scenes where nobody sees the long hours, difficult decisions, celebrations—or occasional heartbreak—that go into creating national, and international, programs.

Over the years, Libby has served pageantry as a contestant, coach, judge, state director, national executive and pageant-system founder. Her experience includes serving as Mrs. Oregon America Director and later as COO/Executive Assistant traveling the globe with the Mrs. World pageant, in addition to developing her own programs through Crowning Moment Productions.

But somewhere along the way, her definition of pageantry changed. It became less about finding the woman who could simply look like a queen and much more about finding the woman who understood what being one could actually do.

That philosophy eventually became the foundation of the federally trademarked, Mother Daughter USA®.

THIS IS MORE THAN A PAGEANT.  Mother Daughter USA was created around something Libby believed was missing from traditional competition: substance.  Yes, there would still be gowns. There would still be a stage, beautiful clothes, confidence, poise, crowns and all of the traditions that make pageantry magical.

But there also needed to be PURPOSE. There needed to be a reason for the crown.

That's why Community Involvement Interview became 50% of the Mother Daughter USA score—and why 100% of those interview questions focus on what contestants are doing in their communities. Not what they say they care about. What they're actually doing. It is an extension of a philosophy Libby has carried into her work for years:

SOUL, NOT SOIL.

We spend so much of our lives worrying about what we own, where we live, what we drive, what we wear and what we leave behind. That's the soil. Libby believes our real legacy is found somewhere else. Who did you help? Whose life did you make a little better? What did you teach your children? What will people remember because you were here? That's the soul.

And when a mother and daughter serve their communities together, something even more important happens, one generation teaches the next that giving back isn't something you put on a résumé. It's simply part of who you are.

Libby lives that legacy with feeding those in need, supporting our veterans, and giving of her time and talent to those who ask.  Libby has been married for over 35 years and has 3 children, two of which are daughters, and a grandchild.  Libby is a Christian, the author of the Soul, Not Soil series of short stories, loves to paint, and has taught herself how to crochete.

Her Motto: Luke 12:48  "From everyone who has been given much, much will be demanded; and from the one who has been entrusted with much, much more will be asked"