Someone would have done it sooner or later, but King Camp Gillette was the start of our problems, I believe. By the sheer mention of his name (no pun intended), we know that Gillette was all about razors.
But first, I have to digress. This topic brings up other topics. I often hear my women friends, and sisters say, “Who ever said that women had to shave their arms and legs?” It is always pointed in the direction of some male conspiracy to keep us neat and trim.
But this morning I looked into this. That suggestion is not entirely true. Women, and men, have been shaving since the beginning of time. Just for the record, and to get all conflicts of interest on the table, I, Polly of Short Hair, am a Shaver. I like to shave. I like the way my legs feel when they are shaved and hairless. So there you have it, for what it is worth.
Now back to our Cave Mamas. The prehistoric people, women and men, most likely shaved. That’s what archeologists believe is apparent. They shaved their faces and anywhere else that grew lengthy hair. When they fought in battles with others, it prevented the “others” from grabbing on to that hair. Also, it reduced the chances of getting frostbit. So. The shaving thing dates way back. They used sharpened rocks, by the way, and would drag them along the skin’s surface, like a razor. They also used shells, as tweezers, to pluck.
Skip ahead to the Egyptians. Cleopatra set the trend there. But shaving was more about cleanliness. So women, and men too, would shave all their body hair, except the eyebrows. Egyptians were smarties though. Or in touch with the Extra Terrestrials. They used bee’s wax, spreading it all over their bodies, then peeling it off to remove the hair. The first wax jobs.
The Roman’s were much on the same shaving path. Not only was it a sign of being squeaky clean, it was also a symbol of class. The wealthy were hairless. This was a woman thing only, and they used flint for razors, and scary tweezer things called volsellas. But men? Men were hairy in Rome.
The first real straight razor was manufactured in the 1700s. Women did not shave at all in that century. Then in the 1800s, King Gillette invented a safety razor. Women did not shave in that century either.
But then the 1900s rolled around. And fashion, bore down on the shaving industry. It pressured women into shaving their armpits. So they did. In 1915, Gillette came up with “The First Great Anti-Underarm Hair Campaign.” You guessed it. This was aimed at the prospect of women owning their own razors. Fashion trends continued to “force” women to shave their legs. Shorter skirts, no nylons.
And from that point on, shaving and hair removal has gone the entire spectrum from armpit, to pubic hair, to leg, and all else.
But, when I brought up King Camp Gillette, I did so for two reasons. One, today is his birthday, born back in 1855. And two, he was the inventor of the “disposable” razor as well. Gillette was motivated to invent something that could be used and thrown away, to keep customers coming back. It was part of his business plan.
And that was the start of the “throw-away” generations. We have been disposable people for a long time, and as a result, the land, air, and sea is really piling up with all of our disposable trash. Not just the little things, the big things too. Manufacturers used to build things “to last,” like washers, and refrigerators, or even blenders, and coffee makers. There used to be that “pride” in the brand where you never had to call the Maytag Man.
But they figured out that if things break down in two or three years, and they make them cheaper to buy new ones that to fix the old, their sales will grow. So that’s what they do. And that’s what we do. And our landfills fill up with trash.
Gillette probably didn’t envision that it would come to this. But it has. After his razor success, Gillette shifted his focus to his life views. He was a Utopian Socialist, and published a book titled The Human Drift. He thought that all industry should be taken over by a single corporation owned by the public. The book also spelled out that everyone in the US should live in a giant city called Metropolis powered by Niagara Falls. He wrote more books, with more big ideas, too.
So there you have it. The history of the shaved world and all its disposable trash, built into one. And yes, I am a shaver. But not by the hair of my chinny, chin, chin.
==========
However difficult life may seem, there is always something you can do and succeed at.
— Stephen Hawking
===========
Success consists of going from failure to failure without loss of enthusiasm.
— Winston Churchill
==========
Strive not to be a success, but rather to be of value.
— Albert Einstein
============
