Rooto Searches for a Star and finds Gaylia Davis
While flipping through the pages of vintage newspapers, I came across a giant ad for Rooto sewer line cleaner. It featured a young, attractive woman holding a twenty-five-pound drum of Rooto, and I immediately needed to know more.
The ad revealed her name, Gaylia Davis, so I started digging from there.
What is Rooto?
Rooto is a brand known for its industrial-strength drain cleaners and household chemical products. It has been available in hardware stores for decades, offering solutions for clogged drains and plumbing maintenance. Unlike Roto-Rooter, a well-known plumbing service founded in 1933 by Samuel Blanc, Rooto appears to be a separate entity focused on chemical products rather than plumbing services.
It is still sold in various forms today.
Star Search
In 1951, the advertising agency for Rooto began a search for a young lady to participate in an ad campaign that rivals today’s viral TikTok and Instagram celebrities. At first, they weren’t getting very many applicants but then Gaylia Davis came along and ended the search altogether.
Detroit born and raised
From the Thursday, Oct. 11th, 1951 edition of the Detroit Free Press.
‘MISS SEWER CLEANER’ – Beauty in Boots Gets Kick from Title
Looking as curvaceous as any beauty queen—except for the rubber boots—Miss Gaylia Davis has been selected as “Miss Sewer Cleaner of 1952.”
Gaylia thinks she has as good a chance as “Miss America” to get to Hollywood.
“It may be a soggy title, but if it helps my career I don’t care,” said the 17-year-old brunette, who has a 23-inch waist, 34-inch bust, and 35-inch hips.
Three professional models turned down the title of “Miss Sewer Cleaner” before Gaylia pounced on it. She’s been promised nice, big blowups of her picture at sewer cleaner conventions all over the land. Gaylia, of 493 W. Margaret, said she turned down a scholarship at Mercy College to further her theatrical ambitions. She was an A-student at Pershing High when she graduated in June.
“It was easy getting the job of Miss Sewer Cleaner,” she said.
“I read in The Town Crier column in the Free Press where girls were turning it down.I applied, they looked me over and took me. What’s in a name if you get attention? I may start low down as Miss Sewer Cleaner, but I’m aiming high.”
Gaylia said she was deadly serious about her acting ambitions. She studied at the Civic Light Opera School. Last summer she sang at a Kingsville (Ont.) hotel.
“I nearly knocked myself out singing 17 different songs,” she added. She doesn’t dance.
“But in one contest, the judges got interested in my rhythm,” she said, “and I was offered free dancing lessons.”
Then she became a semifinalist in a movie magazine contest for a Pasadena Playhouse scholarship. “I’ll bet,” Gaylia said, “I’ll get more attention as ‘Miss Sewer Cleaner’ than ‘Miss America’ gets with her title.”
She may be right—Gaylia has her 119 pounds of ambition well stacked.
Miss Sewer Cleaner goes Nationwide
What became of Gaylia Davis
After the ad campaign ran its course, little is known about the young girl with big ambitions. Did she become a Hollywood starlet? Did she go on to model for any other cleaning supply companies? The answer to both of those questions is… no.
I did, however, stumble upon an old post from Weirduniverse.net with a little more information. The author wrote about Gaylia Davis in 2016 and sometime between then and now, Gaylia’s granddaughter wrote an email to the author.
It appears that while Gaylia Davis didn’t end up in Hollywood, she did lead an interesting life. Shortly after the ad campaign she left Detroit and moved to Miami where she met a handsome, young Cuban man named Ernesto Gavalda. Together they performed and danced in various variety shows in Miami as well as Cuba.
According to the granddaughter, Gaylia also did a stint with Barnum & Bailey’s Ringling Brothers Circus. She was one of the Amazonian models that sat upon the elephants. The couple also went on to have six children before divorcing later in life.
It’s interesting to note that Gaylia apparently ended up deciding to live as a homeless evangelist on the streets of Miami Beach before passing away in 2018.
Who is next?
Have you seen someone interesting on television or in the news that you’d like to learn more about? Give me the name and I’ll go from there. Who knows who we might meet next?
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