Long Live the Cherry Queen

Celebrating a century of royalty

From the sun drenched sidewalks and the blocks of parade-goers that line them, life as the National Cherry Festival’s (NCF) Cherry Queen looks pretty sweet. And it is. But despite what it might seem from the Community Royale sidelines, being queen involves much more than waving from a cherry-red convertible while the crowd goes wild.

Each year since 1925 (except during pauses for the Great Depression and World War II), and starting with Gertrude Brown, Traverse City has crowned one young woman its official Cherry Queen, handing over a title that comes with a sash, a crown, and a full year of responsibilities.

But this is no beauty pageant. As an ambassador for the NCF, the queen spends the next 52 weeks making countrywide parade rounds, promoting our cherry industry, and visiting students all over the state to encourage them “to chase their dreams and make an impact,” explains Angela Sayler, the full-time volunteer director of the NCF Queen Program.

A queen alum herself (2009-2010), Sayler and her team of 10 (called The Queen Committee) stay busy keeping the queen busy—arranging her public appearances, recruiting future candidates, and securing the iconic cherry-print wardrobe that sets the Queen’s Court apart.

This spring, 14 candidates competed for a spot on that court, plus the $10,000 scholarship awarded to the Cherry Queen. As finalists Lillian Gray, Magdalen Kleinrichert, Aubrey Manchester, and Georgia Walker close out the festival on Friday, July 10, one of them will immediately take over for 2025 winner Ainslee Hewitt.

Until then, get to know these past and present queens as they give a behind-the-scenes peek at what it means to be a member of NoMi’s royal family.

Ainslee Hewitt – 2025-2026

“If I could, I would go on about just how amazing my mother is,” says reigning queen Ainslee Hewitt (pictured). “Because to me, her little girl, she is my world.”

Maybe that’s why the phrase like mother, like daughter rings especially true for Ainslee and her mom Mitzie, who was crowned NCF Queen back in 1991.

Now, as Ainslee prepares to hand off her own glittering crown and join the ranks of Queen Alumni, she’s reflecting on the advice her mother shared about slowing down and appreciating the whirlwind year—something she took to heart amidst a jam-packed calendar of meet and greets with kiddos at Kingsley Library’s Fancy Nancy Tea Party, baking cherry pies for Munson patients, and keeping up her everyday responsibilities as an NCAA Division III collegiate golfer and student.

“Every event you attend is your first and last as queen,” says Ainslee. “I wish I could stop the clock… Being able to be present and soak in the joys of the moment was a huge lesson.”

Becoming Cherry Queen isn’t the only way Ainslee is following in her mother’s footsteps. As her reign winds down, she’s also exploring a career in rural healthcare, inspired by Mitzie (known to her patients as Dr. Hewitt). Ainslee’s especially interested in addressing the gaps in access that have made many areas across northern Michigan official healthcare deserts.

“I learned from serving as the National Cherry Queen the power of advocating,” says Ainslee. “And rural healthcare is a place that needs it.”

Cindy Pleva (now Pleva-Weber) – 1987-1988

1987 winner Cindy Pleva says there’s two major hurdles every queen candidate faces. The first is finding the courage to run. The second is quelling the self-doubt that follows.

“And that goes for all of us,” she says. “Every challenge we face at any age.”

Had Cindy listened to that persistent little voice, she never would’ve received one of her most treasured keepsakes, a personal note from then-Vice President George H.W. Bush, which he sent to thank her for hand-delivering a northern Michigan cherry pie to him. “My visit was life-changing, especially coming from a girl from one of the smallest cities in the country,” she says.

The world might also be missing out on a bit of cherry innovation inspired by her reign. Cindy’s father Ray, owner of Cedar’s long-loved Pleva’s Meats, began exploring how tart cherries could be used in meat processing to create a healthier food product, coming up with new recipes, like Cherry Pecan Sausage, along the way.

Ray’s foray into cherry innovation and advocacy for the fruit not only brought more dishes to the picnic table, but helped bring better school-lunch options to cafeterias across the country, with his patented blend of spices (and of course, cherry) used as an all-natural, nutritiously dense binding ingredient in burgers provided to students through the school lunch program, an accomplishment that landed him and Cindy guest spots on Oprah.

Thirty years after winning the title, Cindy returned to the festival as Assistant Director of the Queen Program, which has gone through more than a few changes over the years. Back then, Cindy recalls herself and over two dozen other candidates camped out in NMC dorms during Selection Weekend as they all took turns in interviews. And while it was a fun way to make friends, organizers have streamlined the weekend, only asking out-of-towners to spend the night away from home and filling the time between interviews with visits from agriculture experts and breakout sessions to hone their leadership development.

“We have tried to make the first phase of the process full of opportunities for growth so everyone walks away with tools they can use in the future,” Cindy says.

Erin Sullivan – 1999-2000

Sometimes life literally rains on your parade.

Erin Sullivan jokes that her legacy may be being “the queen who had her parades rained on several times throughout the year.” But she wasn’t about to let a little weather dampen her spirits.
After serving on the Queen’s Court once already, Erin arrived at the 1999 coronation surrounded by friends and family, hopeful but also fully prepared to celebrate someone else’s victory again.

This time, it was her turn. Erin was whisked off to a new festival nearly every weekend for the rest of that summer, and once spring arrived, she was back to it until passing the title on to Jennifer Brakel in 2000.

In the frigid months between festival seasons, she met with agricultural leaders and communities to promote the cherry industry. And while these days the anti-inflammatory benefits of cherries are just as well known as all the ways they can be diced into salsa or blended into a milkshake, those benefits were more abstract then. So part of Erin’s run as queen was to dissect and distill academic research papers on the benefits of cherries, then spread the word about our little stone fruit’s status as a superfood to the masses.

“Sometimes experiences seem peripheral,” to our future endeavors, she says of that meticulous if not tedious work. But, years later Erin, who now holds a Ph.D in Biological Psychology, credits that part of her queen duties (plus the public speaking skills she gained doing it) with her current career as a tenured professor out on the West Coast.

Courtney Fountain (now Hanley) – 2005-2006

Courtney Fountain’s first thought following a speech she’d prepared for judges during the 2005 deliberation process was, “I blew it in there.” Having sprinkled in what she considered a pretty clever joke about how George Washington probably would’ve thought twice about chopping down that cherry tree had he only understood the health benefits of the fruit it bore, Courtney was met with crickets.

Turns out, “they were just remaining a neutral panel.” And, as evidenced by her win, she hadn’t “bombed” her speech after all.

If becoming Cherry Queen is a practice in living in the moment, being on the Queen’s Court is a crash course in thick skin and, especially, extroversion.

“A lot of time together is an understatement,” she laughs. From the things most festival-goers don’t see, like nervous breaths before stepping in front of a panel to the front-and-center event appearances that make the week of Cherry Fest so fun, Courtney says she and the other finalists did “everything” together in the days leading up to coronation, including forging lifelong friendships.

After her year in reign, Courtney moved across the country to teach at an Egyptian museum before heading back to NoMi to start her career at TCAPS, choices that took a level of certitude she says came directly from her year as queen which saw her participating in Super Bowl XL events and even having dinner with the Queen of Soul herself, Aretha Franklin. “I went out into the world with more confidence and a willingness to try new things,” Courtney says.

Kaley Schroeder (now Petersen) – 2006-2007

One of Kaley Schroeder’s most cherished memories of her reigning year was knowing that both of her grandmothers, Elsie and Rose, who she calls incredible women full of “love, grit, and grace” were there watching from the audience as she was crowned the 2006 queen. “My family truly rallied around me with love and support,” Kaley says.

But Kaley didn’t grow up dreaming of becoming Cherry Queen. “Actually I love to share this story,” she says. “Because my journey was a bit atypical.”

It started around 2004 on a softball field in Mason County’s Scottville where Kaley, then a high school senior, was encouraged by her coach to run for her hometown’s Harvest Festival Queen. That opportunity, explained her coach, could lead to support running for Traverse City’s Cherry Queen.

So, Kaley went for it, both Harvest Festival Queen, which she was crowned in 2004, and Cherry Queen, two years later—but not before doing a full study-up first. “I wanted to know as much as possible about the cherry industry and all aspects of the business so I was well equipped to represent it,” she says.

An “outlier” compared to the majority of candidates hailing from areas closer to TC, Kaley felt the push to represent the greater agricultural community. “I took that responsibility to heart.”

Now a healthcare leader, Kaley wants anyone thinking about running for queen to take the leap. “It was genuinely formative for me, supporting my growth in so many ways,” she says, calling the people who make up the cherry industry some of “the most incredible” people she’s ever served with. “They call it a cherry family for a reason,” says Kaley. “And even when distances and time separate, that connection very much lives on.”

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