In this volume, Julia Kirk Blackwelder focuses on the beauty 
education industry in racially segregated communities from World 
War I through the 1960s. In this revealing study of two black 
beauty companies of the Jim Crow era, Blackwelder looks at the 
industry as a locus of black entrepreneurial effort and an 
opportunity for young women to obtain training and income that 
promised social mobility within the African American community. 
Blackwelder demonstrates that commerce, gender norms, politics, 
and culture all intersected inside African American beauty schools 
of the Jim Crow era.
 
    The book centers on Marjorie Stewart Joyner of the Madam C. 
J. Walker beauty chain and James H. Jemison of the Franklin 
School of Beauty, two educators who worked throughout their 
business lives to liberate women from the clutches of racial 
prejudices. They stood at the helms of enterprises that brought 
self-reliance and pride of accomplishment to generations of 
African Americans.

    Blackwelder’s well-documented story shows how succeeding 
generations of black women advanced into dignified economic 
independence though work that they and their clients valued for its 
intangible worth.

_________________________________________________________

JULIA KIRK BLACKWELDER is associate dean of the College 
of Liberal Arts and a professor of history at Texas A&M 
University, College Station. Her two earlier books published by 
Texas A&M University Press also focused on aspects of women 
and work.



What people are saying about this book

"Using an extensive array of photos, intimate detail, and personal 
letters, this work effectively reveals a part of African American society 
deeply rooted in the American dream of propriety, middle-class values, 
and initiative. The many details personalize this story and bring it to 
life. The complexities and contradictions of an African American 
industry based on dominant standards of beauty are skillfully woven 
throughout the text. This book presents the Jim Crow era from a fresh 
perspective, offering new revelations of opportunity, industry, and 
struggle."—The Journal of Southern History

". . . reveals a little-known yet significant dimension of American 
beauty culture."—Kathy Peiss, author, Hope in a Jar