Madam C.J. Walker’s American Dream
The dawn of the twentieth century bustled with excitement, and economic possibilities opened for all types of people in the United States. One woman would find her opportunity later in life to become one of the richest and most successful self-made businesswomen in the country. Sarah Breedlove, born in 1867 on a plantation in Delta, Louisiana-the very same plantation her slave parents worked before the war-would use her personal hair loss experience in her late thirties to fashion a product promising to re-grow hair. Armed with her magic “preparation”, she would re-brand herself Madam C.J. Walker, a dignified name in a world of “aunts” and “mammies.” This study will examine the contributions of Madam C.J. Walker and her quest for a hair and cosmetic products empire targeting African American women as the major market for her merchandise.
To understand Sarah Breedlove’s economic success, the circumstances regarding her harsh and sometimes tragic background must be understood.[1] At the age of seven, Sarah became orphaned and was sent to live with her sister and her husband. After suffering abuse at the hands of her brother-in-law, Sarah escaped by marrying at the age of fourteen. She gave birth to her only child Lelia (later A’Lelia), and was widowed by the age of twenty. With no formal education and employment as a washer woman, Sarah struggled to make ends meet.[2] Needing a change of scenery and having hope for better employment, Sarah and her daughter packed up and moved with her brothers to St. Louis. The city offered Sarah an opportunity to form a camaraderie with other Black women, and she became an active member of the St. Paul A.M.E. Church.[3] Sarah’s Christian faith would be an important element in her work ethic and quest toward a better life for herself and her daughter. She re-married John Davis in 1894, but the marriage, rocky from the get-go, would not last. The stresses of life and work caught up to a tired Sarah and she became afflicted with a scalp ailment that caused her to lose nearly all of her hair. Desperate for a cure, she bought products on the market and experimented with homeopathic remedies. One product from African American entrepreneur Annie Malone’s company Poro (who would become an eventual business rival) struck her fancy, so much so, she became employed by Malone’s company and trained as a sales agent. Sarah and David ended their marriage in 1903, at which point she took advantage of an opportunity to move to Denver to sell Malone’s product full time. Before the move, she met and married the suave and charming newspaperman Charles Joseph “CJ” Walker.[4]
After beginning a new adventure in Denver, Sarah still tinkered with her own formula for hair growth. There remains some controversy surrounding the making of her formula. Rumors exist that she stole it from Malone, but she maintained that it was an original formula. She decided to invest in herself and sell her own preparation she called “Madam C.J. Walker’s Wonderful Hair Grower.” While working for Malone’s company, Sarah was able to learn the business and understand the needs of African American women while assisting them with their hair growing issues. After gaining their trust and earning word-of-mouth reviews, Sarah began her own company selling her personal formula and Madam C.J. Walker was born. With business beginning to boom, Walker decided to move her company temporarily, in order to find a bigger space and a bigger population to serve. She temporarily moved her headquarters to Pittsburg, but eventually settled on Indianapolis. Impressed with the people and location, Indianapolis proved to be the progressive and fast-paced hub she was seeking for her mail order and door-to-door business (and eventual manufacturing company). She quickly immersed herself in the city’s culture and joined the Bethel A.M.E. church.[5] Walker would incorporate her Christian faith into her company’s policies and training by promoting leadership, service to others, and charity.[6]
Selling Walker’s Wonderful Hair Grower was only the beginning of the multitude of services that Madam Walker offered. She sold courses on her own “Walker’s Method of Hair Culture” and founded Lelia College (named after her daughter) to train African American women in hair care and beauty culture to ready them for careers in the beauty industry.[7] She opened beauty parlors in major cities and offered correspondence courses in her hair culture method for women who lived in rural areas. She expanded her product line to include cold cream, soap, tetter salve, shampoo, rouge, face powder, anti-aging treatments, cleansers, astringents, and talcum powder and ran ads in newspapers across the country.[8] An ad in the Colorado Statesmen appealed to aging women stating, “to repair the damage done by destructive forces is a process of no short time. But to prevent these bad effects is but the routine of a few precious moments. In either case, Madam C.J. Walker’s Superfine Toilettes stand ready to aid you in the task at hand!”[9] Madam Walker toured the country for years building her brand by networking through churches and ladies church societies in the cities she visited. She gave speeches, taught hair care courses, gave treatments, and earned the respect of her customers.
Madam C.J. Walker created a formidable empire in a rather short period of time, but she was renowned for more than her entrepreneurial success. With wealth came the opportunity to give back to her community. By 1913, her new and luxurious surroundings enabled her to build a lavish home in New York and travel to other countries while opening her social circle to the likes of W.E.B. Dubois, Mary McLeod Bethune, and artists of the Harlem Renaissance. By 1916, her company earnings exceeded $100,000 per year (over 1.5 million in today’s dollars) and she donated generously to causes close to her heart such as funding a Young Men’s Christian Association (YMCA) building for African Americans. Disturbed by the racist attacks on African Americans, she used her notoriety to support the National Association for the Advancement of Colored People (NAACP) by meeting with top political reformers and elected leaders on anti-lynching campaigns.[10] Suffering from kidney disease and high blood pressure at the height of her success, Walker died in 1919.
Madam C.J. Walker’s rags to riches success story encompasses the American dream at the turn of the twentieth century. Using her personal experience with hair loss to formulate a product to start a business, Walker learned through her work experience that the focus on the wants and needs of the customer was priority to earn their trust to earn their dollars. Walker found an underserved market in similar positions as her own and capitalized on the opportunity to serve them. Her non-stop touring to display her wares and learning her customer’s evolving needs paired with an unstoppable force in growing her business can be seen to this day in hair care products inspired by Walker herself -right on the local retail shelf.
[1] For a detailed look at the life of Madam C.J. Walker from her official biographer and great-great granddaughter, see A’Lelia Bundles, On Her Own Ground: The Life and Times of Madam C.J. Walker (New York: Scribner, 2002): for a focus on Walker’s philanthropic efforts, see Tyrone McKinley Freeman, Madam C.J. Walker’s Gospel of Giving: Black Women’s Philanthropy During Jim Crow (Urbana: University of Illinois Press, 2020) and A’Lelia Bundles, Madam Walker Theatre Center: An Indianapolis Treasure (Charleston: Arcadia Publishers, 2013); for a study on the influence of the beauty industry on African American women (including Madam C.J. Walker’s products) see Susanna Walker, Style and Status: Selling Beauty to African American Women, 1920-1975 (Lexington: University Press of Kentucky, 2007) and Brenda A. Randle, “I Am Not My Hair: African American Women and Their Struggles with Embracing Natural Hair!” Race, Gender, & Class 22 no. 1-2 (2015): 114-121.
[2] A’Lelia Bundles, “The Life and Times of Madam C.J. Walker.” History News, 58, no. 1 (Winter 2003): 6-7.
[3] Madam C.J. Walker-Entrepreneur, Philanthropist, Activist Official Website https://madamcjwalker.com/
[4] P.J. Graham, Madam C.J. Walker: Entrepreneur and Self-Made Millionaire (New York: Cavendish Square Publishing, 2020), 28-29; 45-47.
[5] “Former Denverite Succeeds,” Colorado Statesman, December 23, 1911.
[6] Graham, Madam C.J. Walker, 85-86.
[7] “A Distinguished Woman Visitor,” Twin City Star, November 27, 1915.
[8] “As for Beautiful Hair and a Lovely Complexion,” The Monitor (Omaha), December 23, 1920.
[9] “Aiding Nature in Her Work,” Colorado Statesman, July 2, 1921.
[10] Katie Marisco and Page Putnam Miller, Madam C.J. Walker (Ann Arbor: Cherry Lake Publishing, 2008), 32-38.