Create new contact select list - js doesn't trigger until 2nd 'onchange'

On the pages to manually add a contribution or event (civicrm/contribute/add&reset=1&action=add&context=standalone OR civicrm/participant/add&reset=1&action=add&context=standalone), to the right of Select Contact, is a select list for "create new contact" with JavaScript that is supposed to open a jQuery UI window, but it only triggers on the 2nd selection.

The JS is:
onchange="if (this.value) newContact1( this.value, 1 );"