Beauty and Independence

As more women entered the workforce and became independent consumers, these entrepreneurs created a culture of beauty for a new generation of women in an industry in which women could find success. They created jobs not only for themselves, but jobs for other women.

Madam C. J. Walker employed women to sell her products door to door and emphasized the importance of independence. Lydia Pinkham encouraged women to write to her if they had questions about female health and employed a department of women to answer these letters.

A notification in the Daily Times announcing that a representative of Helena Rubinstein would be in Salisbury for three days at R. E. Powell & Co. to provide beauty consultations, March 4, 1933, The Daily Times, Salisbury, MD.

Walker hired “Walker Agents”, women who were trained to sell her products for a commission. She held annual conventions to discuss entrepreneurship and activism, with the first convention held in 1917, Smithsonian National Museum of African American History and Culture.