Beauty Across Time: Part 4
1880: German hairdresser Franz Ströher forms a company he names Wella to manufacture wigs. The company develops perming agents and appliances, as well as revolutionary breakthrough product innovations like Blondor (1933), the world’s first powder lightener, and Koleston Perfect (1950), the first cream haircolor. 1886: David H. McConnell and wife Lucy start the California Perfume Company with its first product, the Little Dot Perfume Set, which contains five different fragrances. The company literally will become a household word: Avon.
1886: Harriet Hubbard Ayer (1849-1903) married at 16 and lived the life of a wealthy society matron in Chicago until 1882, then separated from (and eventually divorced) her husband.
In 1886, she manufactured and sold Recamier Cream, a facial cream named for famous French beauty Madame Juliette Récamier, as a mail-order product.
She lost control of her company in 1893 when her daughter and ex-husband had her committed to a mental asylum. She was released a year later, but her career in the cosmetics industry was over. Ayer became a journalist writing a column on beauty advice for The New York World.
1887: Proctor & Gamble pioneer one of the nation’s first profit-sharing programs. They also are among the first in American industry to invest in a research laboratory.
1888: An unknown inventor from Philadelphia invents the original formulation for Mum, generally recognized as the first-ever "deodorant."
1890: Alexandre Godefoy invents the first electric hair dryer, adapted from a vacuum cleaner.
Coming tomorrow: Makeup Comes Out
