1.United States’ Miami Beach City (FL) is the setting for 1962 Miss Universe.
2.Some countries and dependencies have expressed interest in competing in the contest: Haiti, Malaya (later Malaysia), and Tahiti.
3.Seven countries of the developing world in the semis! These are the following countries: Argentina, Brazil, Colombia, Haiti, and Lebanon, as well as Taiwan and South Korea (at that time both countries were no industrialized nations).
4.Brazil’s Journalist Edilson Cid Varela is Latin America’s only international judge in Long Beach.
5.Miss England , Kim Carlton, picks up two special awards (photogenic and Best National Costume).Despite all this, she fails to advance beyond the second round.
6.Miss Gilette Hazoume will be the first woman to represent the African republic of Dahomey -then known as Benin- in Miss Universe.
7.Latin America stages spectacular success at MU, where the young South American Norma Nolan ,who is of Irish and Italian background, gains the trophy, leaving behind not just her family but a career as fashion model in Buenos Aires. Argentina’s 25 year-old Norma Nolan was a universal queen from 14 July 1962 to 20 July 1963. On the other hand, Argentina’s best previous finish in the pageant was the third place twenty-four months ago following being eliminated in the first phase in 1960.
8.Black-haired Nolan –who was a little-favoreted candidate in Miami Beach– is the only woman from Argentina to have won the universal title. Her international prestige was enhanced when she acted as a telecast judge at MU 1964.
9.Iceland’s national beauty Anna Geirsdottir becomes vice Miss Universe after losing to Miss Nolan in the finals; the island’s best participation over the course of the 20th Century.
10.Debutant Haiti is making some progress in the Pageant. Surprisinlgy, on July 14, 1962, Miss Haiti ,Evelyn Miot, is not eliminated in the preliminary competition, earned her the admiration of fans in Port-au-Prince, the Haitian capital, and in the Caribbean. As a result, she makes history on two fronts–becoming the first black woman to qualify for the second round in MU and the first Haitian to compete in the semi-finals.
11.For the first time since its inception in 1952, Germany -defending champion– is eliminated in the first round in MU.
12.Surprisingly Taiwan’s national delegate Helen Liu Shiu-Man makes the semis and subsequently is ranked fourth in the finals, becoming the first Chinese delegate in history to accomplish that feat. She is so far the most beautiful representative of Asia on U.S. soil ,well ahead of Israel’s Jehudit Mazor, Lebanon’s Nouhad Cabbabe, and South Korea’s Seo Bum-joo.