For a while at least, Miss Vermont was far above the competition to become the next Miss America.

A licensed pilot, Erin Connor flew herself from Burlington, Vermont, to an airport just outside Atlantic City on Sunday, three days before the contestants were to meet the public in the annual welcoming ceremony on the famous Boardwalk.

"I like to make an entrance anywhere I go," she said.

She completed the 350-mile flight in about 2 ½ hours in a Piper Arrow, with two others aboard. Not making the trip, however, were the half-dozen or so evening gowns she'll need when preliminary competition begins next week. Dad drove them down from Vermont.

Connor is one of 51 contestants (each state plus the District of Columbia) who will be introduced to the public late Wednesday afternoon across from Boardwalk Hall, the historic arena where three days of preliminaries will lead up to the nationally televised finale on ABC on Sept. 10.

Here are some things to know about the 97th Miss America pageant:

History

The pageant was established by Atlantic City in 1921 as a way to extend the summer tourism season to the weekend after Labor Day. Margaret Gorman, of Washington, D.C., was the first Miss America.

In 1943, Jean Bartel was crowned Miss America in Atlantic City. In the ensuing year, she raised $2.5 million selling Series E war bonds (which would have been worth over $34 million in today's dollars), more than any other private individual in the United States.

In 1954, Lee Meriwether became the first Miss America to be crowned on live television.

Miss America 1959 Mary Ann Mobley and Miss America 1960 Lynda Lee Mead were the first back-to-back Miss Americas from the same state, Mississippi.

In 1983, Vanessa Williams became the first African-American Miss America, but had to relinquish her title 10 months later after nude photos of her emerged that were taken before she won the title. She was welcomed back to the Miss America fold in 2015 with a nationally televised apology from current pageant officials over how the situation was handled.

The pageant moved to Las Vegas for six years before returning to Atlantic City in 2013.

Money

The top winner will receive $50,000 in scholarship money. The Miss America Organization says it will hand out $302,000 in scholarship funds this year.

Upcoming

Preliminary competition: Sept. 6-8, Boardwalk Hall (not televised).

"Show Us Your Shoes" parade: Saturday, Sept. 9, Atlantic City Boardwalk.

Finale and crowning of Miss America 2018: Sunday, Sept. 10, 9 p.m. EDT.

Celebrity Judges

TV and radio host and author Maria Menounos; former Miss America Nina Davuluri; vocalist Thomas Rhett; author, actress and model Molly Sims; recording artist and actress Jordin Sparks; and People magazine Editor in Chief Jess Cagle.

Hosts

Chris Harrison ("The Bachelor" and "Who Wants To Be A Millionaire") and Sage Steele (ESPN's "SportsCenter on the Road" and "SportsCenter: AM").

Police descended on a Montgomery County community Wednesday morning, focusing on a parking lot next to a church.

Officers could be seen in the area of St. Teresa of Avila at Parkview Drive and Trooper Road in Norristown around 8:30 a.m. SkyForce10 captured police gathered in the parking lot.

A former suburban police officer was holed up in the church, law enforcement sources said.

The incident ended when the former officer came out without incident before 10 a.m.

No one at the church answered the phone Wednesday morning.

In an attempt to maintain trust between law enforcement officials and immigrant communities, the City of Philadelphia filed a lawsuit in federal court Wednesday morning against U.S. Attorney General Jeff Sessions, who recently imposed new restrictions on federal grant money for so-called "sanctuary cities."

Similar lawsuits against the attorney general have already been filed in five municipalities, including Chicago, San Francisco and Los Angeles.

The city hopes to prevent Sessions from imposing new and “unprecedented” requirements on the Edward Byrne Memorial Justice Assistance Grant (or JAG grant), which provided Philadelphia with $1.6 million last year to spend on police overtime, training, equipment, courtroom technology and other aspects of the criminal justice system.

“As you know, the city welcomed immigrants long before I was ever mayor,” Kenney said. “Immigrants are key to the success of Philadelphia.”

The lawsuit refers to Philadelphia's "vibrant immigrant community" as a vital part of its workforce and says the city has adopted policies "that seek to foster trust between the immigration population and city officials and employees." As a rule, Philadelphia officers do not ask residents about their immigration status.

Sessions, at the behest of the Trump administration, announced new conditions in late July for any city or state receiving JAG money. They required municipalities to provide ICE with 48-hour notice of any scheduled release of so-called prisoners of interest and allow immigrations officials to interview inmates while in custody.

“As far as we can tell, these unprecedented grant conditions are purely political,” Kenney said. “The Trump administration claims that it is imposing these to keep Philadelphians safer, but the facts don’t lie. Philadelphia isn’t breaking federal law. We’re doing smart policing and, as a result, we had the lowest level of crime in 2016 that we’ve had in 40 years.”

The lawsuit contends that while JAG money goes through the U.S. Attorney General’s Office, the grant was established by Congress to help local law enforcement fight crime. It cannot be changed or amended without authorization from Congress to expand immigration enforcement.

“We are therefore asking a court to intervene and to recognize that the Attorney General lacks the authority to impose any of these conditions,” City Solicitor Sozi Pedro Tulante said. “Fundamentally, the Attorney General cannot use this vital … funding as a way to coerce Philadelphia into implementing federal immigration policy.”

The Department of Justice called the lawsuit "a disservice" by "protecting criminal aliens rather than law-abiding citizens."

"When criminal aliens are returned to the streets instead of sent home, public safety is undermined," said Department of Justice spokesman Devin M. O'Malley.

But immigration advocates argue that asking police to perform ICE duties would only undermine an already fragile trust built between law enforcement officials and immigrant communities.

A May 2017 report conducted by FiveThirtyEight found that immigrants in three cities, including Denver and Philadelphia, reported fewer crimes committed against them after the election of President Donald Trump. While this could signal crime is down overall, it could also suggest immigrants are scared of being profiled or deported, according to advocates. 

"We want to send the message that Philadelphia is a safe place," Miriam Enriquez, executive director of Philadelphia's Office of Immigrant Affairs, said. "We don't want people to be afraid to speak out."

On Wednesday, Kenney also signaled a willingness to help undocumented immigrants, especially children, impacted by Tropical Storm Harvey. Philadelphia offered assistance to people displaced by Hurricane Katrina in 2009 and could do so again.

“We have the capacity to do that and we have the heart to do that,” he said. “We’re just trying to figure out how to help without being in the way.”

Kenney has at least one ally in Philadelphia Councilwoman Helen Gym, who issued a statement expressing her support for the lawsuit.

"I am proud to stand with Mayor Kenney and the City of Philadelphia as we take on the outrageous actions of this federal administration," she said. 

NBC10's Pamela Osborne spoke with members of the National Guard at Joint Base McGuire-Dix-Lakehurst. They are going to Houston to help out with any rescue missions that they can as Harvey continues to flood Texas.

This summer's great murder-mystery surrounding a man hanged in Philadelphia 121 years ago and known as "America's first serial killer" has been solved.

We think.

An eight-part television show called "American Ripper" on the History Channel that examined the life, death and legends surrounding mass murderer Herman Mudgett, aka H.H. Holmes, concluded Tuesday night.

NBC10 Investigators were first to unearth the growing mystery in April of the Holmes conspiracy that he escaped death. Then, in July, NBC10 exclusively reported that a search for the truth was underway — with Holy Cross Cemetery in Delaware County as the epicenter.

The question all along, spurred on by co-host and Holmes's great-great-grandson, Jeff Mudgett, was whether Holmes actually was hanged at Moyamensing Prison in South Philadelphia in 1896 and then buried at the Yeadon cemetery.

Mudgett and a team of anthropologists from the University of Pennsylvania exhumed bones found at the grave site Holmes was believed to be buried. Then came skeletal analysis and facial reconstruction and look backs at newspaper accounts questioning whether Holmes escaped his hanging.

Like this news story, the television show waited a while — until the final seconds of the 42-minute season finale — to reveal the DNA evidence that would prove conclusively whether Holmes did indeed hang.

In the end, the evidence concluded ... the body in the grave was indeed Holmes.

DNA analysis at Kings College in London, England, comparing the skull of the skeleton in the grave to Mudgett's DNA, proved a match. By Wednesday morning, the Philadelphia Archdiocese re-interred the skeletal remains in his grave at the Yeadon cemetery.

Watch NBC10 News at 6 p.m. to see investigative reporter George Spencer talk more about the grave excavation, the results of the DNA testing and the re-burial Wednesday of Holmes's body at Holy Cross Cemetery.

"Dental records and DNA testing reveal a conclusive link to Jeff Mudgett," the show announced in its final moments. "Proving that the remains exhumed are those of H.H. Holmes. The result ends a century of speculation about Holmes' final days."

Mudgett, however, remains skeptical.

"This doesn't deter me from my investigation. There are too many coincidences for this to be another bogus theory," he said of connections between his ancestor and theories that Holmes killed as many as 200 people in several cities, as well as, possibly London.

Holmes is best known for his “Murder Castle” in Chicago. He built the hotel equipped with secret rooms, chambers and a spot dissections in the basement. With visitors from around the globe visiting the city’s World’s Fair in 1893, Holmes’ unwitting guests checked in but some never left. 

It’s believed Holmes sold his victims’ bodies, organs and bones. According to Rider University Professor Joe Wojie the going rate was about $8 to $10 a body.

Holmes' story was portrayed in the 2003 book "The Devil in the White City" by Erik Larson.

According to newspaper accounts, Holmes was marched to the gallows at Moyamensing Prison a year after he was convicted of murder in 1895.

The prison was located on 1400 South 10th Street in Philadelphia before it closed in 1963 and was demolished in 1968. Holmes’ body was eventually interred at Holy Cross Cemetery in Yeadon. Holmes requested his casket be encased in concrete so no one would steal his body.

An 1898 newspaper article sparked the conspiracy theory that Holmes somehow escaped death at Moyamensing and ended up in South America. On Tuesday night, the History Channel show may have put a final nail in that theory's coffin.

A South Jersey man already accused of sexually assaulting a woman then posting the incident to Snapchat is now accused of sexually assaulting a teen last year.

Gibbsboro police found the 18-year-old bloodied, bruised and disoriented inside Maison Mallon’s home on Aug. 19 after a friend of the victim alerted investigators to Mallon’s Snapchat post, Camden County Prosecutor Mary Eva Colalillo said in a news release.

The woman became unconscious after drinking at Mallon's home, investigators said. She required two surgeries following the attack.

On Tuesday, a judge ordered Mallon held without bail as the 24-year-old awaited trial on aggravated sexual assault, aggravated assault and related charges in this case and other charges stemming from two earlier accusations of sexually assaulting two minors in Feb. 2016.

On Wednesday, the county prosecutor announced that a 17-year-old came forward to allege that Mallon sexually assaulted her in his home in March 2016. She told investigators that she couldn’t move her body after Mallon gave her a drink – he then sexually assaulted her, investigators said.

Mallon faces additional charges in that case.

Anyone with more information about Mallon is asked to contact Detective Allison Dube-Smith at (856) 225-7105.

A Delaware native living in Houston is overwhelmed by the outpouring of love and support from his home state. NBC10's Delaware bureau reporter Tim Furlong has his story.

Local college athletes are banding together to help those affected by Hurricane Harvey. NBC10's Rosemary Connors shows us how they're taking action.

NBC10 Investigators are digging into SEPTA's safety oversight after 32 people were injured last week when a Norristown high speed line train collided with a parked train at the 69th Street Transportation Center in Upper Darby. NBC10's Mitch Blacher has the details on what may have caused this crash.

A disaster research center in Delaware is sending graduate students to Houston in the wake of Hurricane Harvey. The trip will be a learning experience and help prepare students for when the next disaster strikes. NBC10's Tim Furlong has the story.

A procedure went well for a patient until his insurance company said it wasn't covered on their plan. Unable to meets the demands of the insurance company, the man and his family contacted Harry Hairston and NBC10 Responds.

A Bucks County community hopes to recover some of the resources it has lost fighting the opioid epidemic by suing the makers of those pills.

Bensalem Township intends to bring claims against several drug companies and their subsidiaries, including Purdue Pharma, Teva Pharmaceuticals, Cephalon, Johnson & Johnson and Endo Pharmaceuticals.

“It breaks my heart, personally, and I know it’s breaking a lot of other hearts,” Mayor Joseph DiGirolamo said. “We have to get on top of this situation.”

Bensalem will be the first municipality in Pennsylvania to pursue this kind of large-scale litigation. Similar efforts have already been waged in New Hampshire and Ohio.

“These drug companies misrepresented the dangers of these opiates not only to the public but to the doctors,” State Rep. Gene DiGirolamo said. “They had a misleading advertising campaign saying these things were safe.”

He witnessed the effects of addiction firsthand after his son battled with addiction for several years. Like so many others, DiGirolamo’s son began the path to addiction with painkillers.

“It’s just devastating,” he said. “It’s the first thing you think of when you wake up in the morning and it’s the last thing you think about when you go to bed at night.”

In addition to the personal toll, the financial expense is becoming too great, officials said. Tens of millions of dollars that should have gone towards public safety in Bensalem Township has instead been used to fight addiction and related crime. Since 2006, there has been a 96 percent increase in drug-related calls. Emergency personnel have already spent $1.58 million since 2014 responding to those calls.

“Many of us have friends and family who are impacted,” Thomas Topley, a 30-year EMT, said. “Sometimes we’re at a house six, seven, eight times. What about the guy down the street having a heart attack?”

Pennsylvania Attorney General Josh Shapiro signaled he will also be joining the fight against certain pharmaceutical companies. He announced a “meaningful investigation into the manufacture, marketing and distribution” of opioids that will involve more than 40 state attorney generals.

“This is a big fight and it takes the chief law enforcement officers of states around the country working together to win it,” he said in a statement.

NBC10 reached out to several companies targeted by Bensalem officials. Purdue, Teva and Janssen each denied any wrongdoing. Johnson & Johnson and Cephalon did not respond.

“We recognize opioid abuse is a serious public health issue that must be addressed. At the same time, we firmly believe the allegations in these lawsuits are both legally and factually unfounded,” a spokesman for Janssen said, adding that the company has “acted responsibility and in the best interests of patients and physicians."

“We share Bensalem Township officials’ concerns about the opioid crisis and we are committed to working collaboratively to find solutions,” a spokesperson for Purdue said.

How much water did Tropical Storm Harvey produce? NBC10 First Alert Weather meteorologists Tammie Souza and Krystal Klei break down the numbers.

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Here are some Harvey rainfall facts:

• More than 51 inches of rain have fallen during Harvey as of Wednesday (New record for any single tropical system over the US mainland, the 50-state record was set in Hawaii with 52 inches)

• Harvey has dropped 15 trillion gallons of water on Texas so far (Katrina had 6.5 trillion gallons)

• Philadelphia uses 225 million gallons of water each day, meaning Harvey would provide enough water to supply the city for 182 years

So how much land would 15 trillion gallons of water cover?

• 15 inches of rain would cover the entire state of Pennsylvania

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• 7.5 feet of water would cover the entire state of New Jersey

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• 26 feet of water would cover the entire state of Delaware

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• 200 tornado warnings were also issued over Texas during Harvey

A vandal snipped the television wires at a Bethlehem bar and restaurant called "Corked" on Saturday night, just before the big Mayweather-McGregor fight.

Owner Joe Grisafo said his business lost $10,000 when he had to refund about 200 patrons who came to see the bout. The motive remains unknown. Police are searching for the saboteur.

This summer's great murder-mystery surrounding a man hanged in Philadelphia 121 years ago and known as "America's first serial killer" has been solved.

We think.

An eight-part television show called "American Ripper" on the History Channel that examined the life, death and legends surrounding mass murderer Herman Mudgett, aka H.H. Holmes, concluded Tuesday night.

NBC10 Investigators were first to unearth the growing mystery in April of the Holmes conspiracy that he escaped death. Then, in July, NBC10 exclusively reported that a search for the truth was underway — with Holy Cross Cemetery in Delaware County as the epicenter.

The question all along, spurred on by the show's co-host and Holmes' great-great-grandson, Jeff Mudgett, was whether Holmes actually hanged at Moyamensing Prison in South Philadelphia in 1896 and was then buried at the Yeadon cemetery.

Mudgett and a team of anthropologists from the University of Pennsylvania exhumed bones found at the grave site Holmes was believed to be buried. Then came skeletal analysis and facial reconstruction and look backs at newspaper accounts questioning whether Holmes escaped his hanging.

Like this news story, the television show waited a while — until the final seconds of the 42-minute season finale — to reveal the DNA evidence that would prove conclusively whether Holmes did indeed hang.

In the end, the evidence concluded ... the body in the grave was indeed Holmes.

DNA analysis at Kings College in London, England, comparing the skull of the skeleton in the grave to Mudgett's DNA, proved a match. By Wednesday morning, the Philadelphia Archdiocese re-interred the skeletal remains in his grave at the Yeadon cemetery.

"Dental records and DNA testing reveal a conclusive link to Jeff Mudgett," the show announced in its final moments. "Proving that the remains exhumed are those of H.H. Holmes. The result ends a century of speculation about Holmes' final days."

Mudgett, however, remains skeptical.

"This doesn't deter me from my investigation. There are too many coincidences for this to be another bogus theory," he said of connections between his ancestor and theories that Holmes killed as many as 200 people in several cities, as well as, possibly London.

Holmes is best known for his “Murder Castle” in Chicago. He built the hotel equipped with secret rooms, chambers and a spot for dissections in the basement. With visitors from around the globe visiting the city’s World’s Fair in 1893, Holmes’ unwitting guests checked in but some never left. 

It’s believed Holmes sold his victims’ bodies, organs and bones. According to Rider University Professor Joe Wojie the going rate was about $8 to $10 a body.

Holmes' story was portrayed in the bestselling 2003 book "The Devil in the White City" by Erik Larson.

According to newspaper accounts, Holmes was marched to the gallows at Moyamensing Prison a year after he was convicted of murder in 1895.

The prison was located on 1400 South 10th Street in Philadelphia before it closed in 1963 and was demolished in 1968. Holmes’ body was eventually interred at Holy Cross Cemetery in Yeadon. Holmes requested his casket be encased in concrete so no one would steal his body.

An 1898 newspaper article sparked the conspiracy theory that Holmes somehow escaped death at Moyamensing and ended up in South America. On Tuesday night, the History Channel show may have put a final nail in that theory's coffin.

Watch NBC10 News at 6 p.m. to see investigative reporter George Spencer talk more about the grave excavation, the results of the DNA testing and the re-burial Wednesday of Holmes' body at Holy Cross Cemetery.

It's back to school time in less than a week for Philadelphia children and there are a few spots left for Pre-K. The Philadelphia Soda Tax is paying for classes across the city this year. NBC10's Aundrea Cline-Thomas has the details on the high demand.

Several Philly restaurants are donating 100 percent of Thursday's sales to victims of Harvey. NBC10's Drew Smith has the details.

Philadelphia firefighters joined the rescue effort in Texas as first responders continue to help victims of Harvey. NBC10's Randy Gyllenhaal is in Texas with the details.

One person died while two other people are fighting for their lives following a crash in Bedminster Township, Bucks County Wednesday night.

Two vehicles collided on the 7200 block of Easton Road shortly before 10 p.m. One person died in the crash while two others were taken to the hospital where they are currently in critical condition.

Officials have not yet identified the victims.

Easton Road reopened overnight.

The Wawa Foundation stopped by NBC10 Thursday morning to drop off a large donation to the American Red Cross' Harvey relief efforts. We have several ways you can contribute as well.