Madam C.J. Walker: A Queen of a Different Color

Madam C.J. Walker isn't a name that springs to mind when we think of beauty products, at least not like Arden and Rubinstein anyway.  Though she could afford it, she wouldn't be seen dining in the Empire Room at the Waldorf Astoria because she wasn't permitted and despite being the first American female self-made millionaire, Vogue never would have called on her for an interview.  You see, Madam wasn't white but that didn't stop her from building a very successful haircare business aimed at an untapped black American market.

Sarah Breedlove was born in 1867 on a cotton plantation in Delta, Louisiana.  Her parents, former slaves, died in 1874 and she was living with her sister when she married Moses McWilliams at 14.  She had her only child, Lelia, and when her husband died a short time later she and her daughter moved to St. Louis where she worked as a washerwoman for the next 17 years.

Hair loss was a common problem owing to outdoor plumbing and the inability to wash hair as often as we do today.  Sarah tried every remedy on the market but nothing worked for her.  She wrote, "...A big black man appeared to me and told me what to mix up for my hair...I mixed it, put it on my scalp, and in a few weeks my hair was coming in faster than it had ever fallen out...I made up my mind I would begin to sell it."*  Aware of the competition in St. Louis, she shrewdly headed for Denver in 1905 to sell her homemade products door-to-door.  She produced Wonderful Hair Grower scalp treatment containing sulfur, Vegetable Shampoo and Glossine to straighten black hair using heated metal combs. 

After a brief marriage to John Davis, she married newspaper sales agent Charles Joseph Walker in 1906 and added Madam to make her self-titled products more appealing.  He devised an aggressive marketing plan and set up a mail order business with innovative ads that showed before and after images.  He was content with minimal success but Madam was ambitious and left him to strike out on her own.  She put her daughter in charge of mail orders while she traveled cross-country to promote her products.  They moved to Pittsburgh in 1908 and established Lelia College to train "Walker Agents" in the "Walker System of Hair Culture". 

These graduates were offered an opportunity never before available to them.  They could make in one week what the average colored woman made in a month.  By teaching them how to set up and run home-based beauty shops these women were able to buy homes and educate their children, no small feat for a woman in those days, black or white.  

 

 In 1910, Madam visited Indianapolis and saw a city connected to eight major railroads 

making it ideal for her ever-growing mail order business.  A large thriving black community was another incentive to build Madame C. J. Walker Laboratories there.  The factory contained a salon and college where women were taught to style hair, give massages, manicures and scalp treatments.  

On an interesting note, no women were slated to speak at the 13th Annual Convention of the National Negro Business League in 1912.  Madam, disregarding moderator Booker T. Washington, walked straight up to the podium and said, "Surely you are not going to shut the door in my face. I feel that I am in a business that is a credit to the womanhood of our race. I am a woman who started in business seven years ago with only $1.50."*  You can  bet she was on the roster for the 14th Annual Convention!

Her women's business conventions recognized both sales as well as black achievements.  She herself was a generous philanthropist who contributed to several black educational institutions, orphanages and organizations like the YWCA and the NAACP to which she contributed $5,000 for it's Anti-Lynching Campaign to make the act a federal crime.  In 1913, she bought a house in Harlem which included a salon and training facility.  She moved to NY permanently in 1916 and built a mansion in Irvington-on-Hudson, an upscale community north of the city not far from John D. Rockefeller.  Sadly, she died just a short time later in 1919 leaving behind a company valued at over one million dollars.

She never saw her final dream realized; the vision born out of rage.  Fond of the movies, she put down a dime for a ticket at the Isis theater in Indianapolis and was told the price was a quarter for "colored persons".  Madam sued the theater and hired an architect to plan a new building.  It would cover a block and besides manufacturing and training, would offer a social and cultural center for the black community complete with a theater.   

Equally spirited, soon after her mother's death Lelia changed her name to A'Lelia and became a major supporter of the Harlem Renaissance movement.  She carried on her mother's business and finished The Walker Building in 1927 which at the time employed about 3000 black men and women.  Though it's still in operation as Madam C.J. Walker Enterprises, as of 1985 the Walker family is no longer involved with the company.   Today, the building is home to the Madam Walker Theatre Center and other businesses.  

Not forgotten, in 1998, the US Postal Service issued the Madam C.J. Walker Commemorative stamp as a part of its Black Heritage Series and in 2001, her great-great-grandmother A'Lelia Bundles wrote "On Her Own Ground: the Life and Times of Madam C. J. Walker.  Most recently, this past March 2, she was one of 10 Hoosiers chosen for a Legacy Award by the state of Indiana.  The images and biographies of those chosen are displayed on 6-foot-high columns along Georgia Street in downtown Indianapolis.

Madam said, "I had to make my own living and my own opportunity! But I made it! Don't sit down and wait for the opportunities to come. Get up and make them!"  I've written of women of this era who succeeded despite all odds but never with the added burden of color and widespread racism.  This extraordinary woman, haircare queen and entrepreneur earned her place not only in the beauty industry but also in history.

Falls Avenue Vintage Fashion

Main Sources:

*National Park Service US Dept of the Interior

http://www.madamcjwalker.com/

http://www.inc.com/30years/articles/madam-cj-walker.html

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Madam_C._J._Walker

Photos from the A'Lelia Bundles Walker Family Collection