9/4/2004:
The Community Welfare Association was started in Fargo in 1927 to coordinate a community-wide effort to help meet human service needs. Its name was changed to the United Fund of Fargo in 1957, and then in 1964, it became the United Fund of Fargo-Moorhead. In the summer of 1966, employee Jim Backus came up with a jingle idea based on a combination of the towns’ names: FarMoor. The tune started with “Let’s give Far More, More than we ever gave before...”
Renee Holoien was a pretty 17 year-old working for the organization that summer, and Backus decided she should be “Miss FarMoor,” the organization’s beauty queen – or as she puts it, “their mascot.” Holoien was trotted out for parades and also appeared on the local TV show, Party Line, with hostess Verna Newell. The title of Miss FarMoor was retired after Holoien’s reign, because the organization was renamed once again... the United Fund of Fargo-Moorhead-Dilworth.
Dakota Datebook written by Merry Helm