Hope in a Jar Essay

Lani Barry

History of Make Up

Professor Hewitt

Hope In A Jar

Manufacturing ‘Pretty’

Beauty culture, then, should be understood not only as a type of commerce but as a system meaning that helped women navigate the changing conditions of modern social experience. (Peiss, 6)

Kathy Peiss’s Hope In A Jar: The Making of America’s Beauty Culture’, is a wonderfully thorough account of how the cosmetics industry developed in the United States. A journey from the humble beginnings of ancestral homemade herbal remedies, to the thousands of skincare and makeup options available to women today, it’s a detailed education on how ‘beauty’ has always apart of our world. The story differs by each generation, race, and gender, but it offers a unique perspective on what constituted cosmetics, how entrepreneurs began offering products, and how marketing changed over time.

In the beginning, makeup was ‘paint’, and it rarely had a home in the lives of women. Cosmetics were herbal concoctions, elixirs, and creams to take care of skin conditions that arose in day-to-day life. These recipes were kept in booklets compiled by generations of women, passing them onto their daughters so that they would be well versed in the medicinal effects of plants and herbs. Maintaining the health of the family was a responsibility of a wife, and the recipe booklets kept accumulated knowledge on botany that could cure a variety of maladies.

‘Paint’ was for two opposite ends of the spectrum; prostitutes and the wealthy. The concept that true beauty was obtained through purity of heart and spirit was a common theme from the puritans to the Victorian era. A glowing countenance was symbolic of a good-natured soul, and only deceptive women trying to manipulate others (such as prostitutes or social-climbing women) used powder, rogue, and other paints. On the other hand, the upper classes used paints for self-expression and socially navigating in court, especially when it was in fashion to be painted.

By the late 1800’s face powders, face creams, and skin treatments began to become available commercially. Following the beauty ideal of youthful, Caucasian pale skin and rosy cheeks, women often applied cosmetics that contained dangerous toxins and grievously injured them. Mixtures that once were a woman’s domain, male-run companies and druggists began to offer similar cosmetics. The inception of said skin creams and treatments had originally begun in the kitchens of women, and were now available to those who did not have access to homemade treatments.

Male perspective and involvement in beauty culture is a reoccurring topic in ‘Hope in a Jar’. Each decade readdresses the perception men had on cosmetics as a shallow symbol of vanity and deceitful. 19^th Century literature criticized the ‘enameling studio’ and the rogues and powders worn by women. Public application of makeup in the 1920’s caused a riot. The mirror compact, powdering noses, mascara, and varieties of lipstick were all wielded in public venues as women no longer feared being made-up. During World War Two, women were chided for their extravagance in demanding lipstick – especially when resources and materials were scarce. It’s as if men had always found makeup a petty indulgence, preferring ‘natural beauty’ and rejecting cosmetics that might inhibit their biological ability to obtain a physically desirable mate.

Despite the clear aversion to the use of makeup, men still managed to maintain a steady control over the industry of cosmetics. Ponds, Noxema, and Max Factor were male manufacturers and developers of cosmetics and makeup. Male inventors and chemists’ also created familiar names such as Maybelline and L’Oreal, many of which have men as their CEO’s and board chairman’s today. Due to prevalent sexism in business, companies that started as small mail-order operations or beauty centers founded by women were susceptible to being overtaken by men.

Women often struggled with husbands or relatives for control of their companies. The marriages of [Madam C.J.] Walker and [Annie Turnbo] Malone ended in divorce over business conflicts; Harriet Hubbard Ayer’s ex-husband and daughter charge her with mismanagement, committed her to an asylum, and assumed control of the company. (Peiss, 71)

A personal interpretation on these idea is that it wasn’t personal – it was just business. Regardless of how men really felt about the use of cosmetics, the beauty would continue to thrive if there was money to be made in a prevailing market. Male-run companies developed marketing techniques where they would rely on female consultants to give light on how to approach female buyers. Through the use of magazine ads, radio ads, and promotional sales girls at the cosmetic counters, men had managed to target their audience by fabricating the intimate sense of a female community. They were able to tap into the desires women had for beauty, marriage, and romance to sell sets of creams and makeup products.

The allure of obtainable wealth and glamour was always a vehicle for marketing. Despite pulling herself out of economic hardship as an immigrant, Elizabeth Arden chose to market her line of cosmetics and makeup exclusively, only selling her products in the most elite of stores. Movie stars and wealthy socialites were used in promotional ads, advocating and endorsing their use of specific products – even if they didn’t use them. Kathy Peiss wrote; “Increasingly the ad agency turned to European aristocrats and American socialites whose celebrity derived simple from their wealth and standing”. (137)

While men in the business may have not contemplated the psychological reasons for a woman to ‘make herself up’, newspaper cartoons and editorials early 20^th century publications reveal letters by ordinary men, who were confounded by their wives and girlfriends need to partake in beauty rituals (such as the cartoon by W.E. Hill on page 179 titled ‘Make-Up’.) Some men had prevailing thoughts on how makeup use was a sign of a woman’s deceiving nature, some thought women only painted to please or compete with their female peers, yet many women engaged in a beautifying ritual for self-satisfaction.

Makeup continued to be understood by many men as the mark of women’s artificiality and guile. Writing to the Seattle Union Record, Marco B. called it a “method of seeking satisfaction…by falseness and deception” and “a confession of women’s shallowness and incapacity.” In response, cosmetics-using women translated the signs of artifice into the language of artistry. (Peiss, 180)

In these early days of cosmetics, women were taking their independence into their own hands by challenging social norms with the use of makeup. At the same time, male use of cosmetics was interpreted as feminine, and a man who partook in a grooming regiment was perceived as a ‘fop’ or a ‘dandy’. After the Second World War, everything began to shift in a different direction.

Suddenly coping with the loss of their wartime employment, and the return of their husbands and male relatives, women were ushered back into the home. The attained independence became reversed, 1950’s culture of the docile housewife prevailed and women began to grow listless. Along with marriage and family, achievement of femininity became the projected ideal for women. Mixed messages of wholesomeness and subtle sexuality appeared in cosmetic marketing, luring women into the fantasy of makeup with the promise of attainable beauty. As Kate Peiss said, “The answer lay not in seeking educational and employment opportunities, […] but in a ‘wonderful escape’ into the fantasy world of feminine beauty.” (248)

For men, the military experience of the war had introduced an entire generation to standard grooming practices. Men began to shave regularly, use cologne or aftershave, deodorant, facial cleansing products, lip balm, and some even used makeup such as mascara to shape and define lashes and brows. Attempts during the 1920s and Great Depression of the 1930’s had failed to market the use of cosmetics and toiletries to men as anything less than feminine. Even catchy masculine names of products and catchphrases (“Lets NOT Join The Ladies”, 165 & 166) still hadn’t managed to gain the respect of men. Using manly scents and packaging design, they placated to men by playing up the masculinity of the heterosexual male.

Business week reported in 1953. Its survey found that men shaved on average five times a week, much more regularly than before the war; half used aftershave, and over one-third used deodorant – a figure the magazine called “startling”. (Peiss, 255)

For every chapter in ‘Hope in a Jar’ that focuses on a particular theme, there is a thorough examination of the African-American experience. Regardless of the decade in which cosmetics and makeup were developing, the desirable standard of beauty was that of a youthful white female with pale skin. Hair straightening with hot irons and lye, and the use of facial bleachers was a constant topic of debate for African-American beauty. After only a few decades of having attained freedom from slavery, the black community was now faced with having to conform to white standards of beauty in order to progress socially.

Lighter skinned women who could pass as Creole or European had an easier time gaining employment or finding a husband, as opportunities only became available to those who were closer to the white standard of beauty. Early cosmetic ads for facial bleachers that were marketed to white women, showed drastic before-and-after illustrations of the product’s ability to turn what appeared to be a rustic black woman to a refined white lady. Victorian publications by the African American community that discussed ‘The New Negro Woman’ still showed illustrations of women with smaller facial features and straightened hair.

Similar facial-bleach products that were manufactured for African Americans by white company owners often damaged the skin, causing disfiguration, burns, and peeling off layers of skin. These companies often did not even employ African Americans, and they rebuked any claims the Black community laid against them for experimenting on their people with hazardous products.

Annie Turnbo, Sarah Breedlove, and Madam C.J. Walker are just few of the women mentioned who pioneered cosmetic products and business on their own, progressing from mail-order and word of mouth promotions to beauty salons, eventually growing in to empires that in turn worked to elevate the African American community.

Advocating Christian principles in business, both walker and Malone dedicated themselves to black social welfare and community building, including industrial education, recreational programs, and charitable giving. (Peiss, 93)

These women advocated against the use of facial bleaches, to lighten the skin was to deny African roots. There was no shame in their African ancestry, and these women looked to redefine their society’s perceptions on beauty. Instead of promoting the straightening of their hair, hair care was emphasized. Breakage, scalp dryness, and management of brittle hair were a concern for many women. With their products such as ‘Wonderful Hair Grower’ and ‘Poro’, the maintaining of healthy ethnic hair was possible without resorting to destroying it with lye.

After decades of avoiding creating cosmetics for anyone outside the white demographic, it eventually became imperative for the cosmetics industry to recognize African Americans when marketing to the masses. However, when producing facial powders in varieties of darker shades, the packaging imagery and product names still steered away from blacks. The women depicted on the packaging of Nile Queen products were illustrated to look middle-eastern, with lighter skin tones and waves of silky hair. Even one of the 1924 ads for Madam C. J. Walker’s toiletries had a woman with long hair and small European features.

Cosmetic companies, newspapers, magazines, and universities began showcasing their definitions for a modern, successful, and beautiful black woman. Beauty pageants for African American women became popularized, yet the finalists of the contests all possessed lighter skin tones and wavy hair.

It seems the changing point for women of every race was in the 1960’s and 1970’s, when the cultural norms for and beauty standards were publicly questioned and advocated against by the women’s liberation movement. For a period women used less cosmetics, and rejected beauty wares that suggested conformity.

Cosmetics have come along way. A tube of lipstick can represent social freedom or chains of a gender role. A tub of cold cream isn’t just a facial cleanser, but the ancestor to all the products contemporary women use to define themselves by. Whether we’re men or women, black or white, we’ve all been confronted with these regulations of beauty and normalcy. A magazine ad or enticing package, marketing promises to give us what we’re missing to achieve what we want. Out of all Kathy Peiss 270 pages of captivating history, one particular segment has stayed with me:

Women reported as early as the 1930’s that advertising and social pressures to be attractive lowered their self-esteem. (Peiss, 6)

Therefore, if cultural concepts of beauty are simply a business, and that women use it to maneuver through the ever-changing guidelines of what is ‘en vogue’, then our human need for acceptance and validation hasn’t changed at all throughout history - just the packaging.

Citations used:

Peiss, Kathy. Hope in a Jar: The Making of America's Beauty Culture. New York: Henry Holt and Company Inc., 1998. 6-255. Print.