Mona Freeman, who had never ridden a subway when she was crowned New York City’s first Miss Subways in 1941 — an appointment that led to a modest career as a film and television actress — died on May 23 at her home in Beverly Hills, Calif. She was 87.

Her daughter, Mona Hubbell, confirmed her death.

Ms. Freeman was just 14 when she was named Miss Subways, a title bestowed on about 200 young women before the competition was retired 35 years later.

For a generation of midcentury straphangers, Miss Subways, smiling down from placards in thousands of cars on the IRT, IND and BMT lines, was as deeply ingrained in the city’s workaday fabric as Schrafft’s, the automat and that heavenly coffee.

Run by the New York Subways Advertising Company in conjunction with the John Robert Powers modeling agency, the contest was conceived to draw riders’ eyes to the surrounding advertisements.