Zaila Avant-garde, a 14-year-old schoolgirl from the state of Louisiana, scripted history on Thursday by becoming the first African-American contestant to win the hugely popular Scripps National Spelling Bee crown.
The achievement saw her break the Indian-American community’s 13-year hold on the trophy that the immigrants had come to see as their stamp of arrival in the United States.
Avant-garde’s winning word was “murraya” - a genus of tropical Asiatic and Australian trees having pinnate leaves and flowers with overlapping petals.
The 14-year-old who had emerged as a popular contestant with quick and easy repartees with the competition’s long-time pronouncer Jacques A Bailly, beat Chaitra Thummala, the last of the Indian-Americans in the finals of the 93rd Spelling Bee, who got the compound word - neroli oil - wrong. Neroli oil is known to be a type of essential oil that is extracted from the flowers of bitter orange trees.
Balu Natarajan was the first Indian-American winner of the Spelling Bee way back in 1985.
{{/usCountry}}Balu Natarajan was the first Indian-American winner of the Spelling Bee way back in 1985.
{{/usCountry}}Indian-Americans won many spelling bee crowns subsequently since 2008. Their unrelenting hold on the competition has been the subject of popular documentaries.
Asked about her victory, Avant-garde said, “I mean, I was a bit surprised.”
“I had been warned about the confetti,” she said, referring to the celebration. “But I didn’t quite understand what they meant, so that was a bit surprising.”
Nine of the 11 finalists were Indian-Americans who have dominated contest for more than a decade now.
The contest was cancelled last year due to the coronavirus pandemic.