Thread: a question about shaving history

I've been wondering lately... what sort of straight razors, if any, were marketed to minority men back in the heyday of straight razor shaving? Especially, were straight razors marketed to black men, or was it restricted at the time to "whites only"? How about Japanese men? Chinese men? And strange as it might seem today, how about Italian men (oh yeah, they were considered "outsiders" before being generally assimilated into "white" American culture). And not to leave anyone out (I can't list all possibilities!), how about any other minority populations?

I was thinking that the claim that str8 shaving reduces razor bumps and ingrown hairs would be of critical importance to black men, who generally have a lot of these shaving related issues. For that matter, are there any black men in the ranks of this forum? I'd love to hear about your experiences with straight shaving. (Me, I'm mostly Portuguese, with a great-great grandmother from Cape Verde... I would never pass for African, but I've got a little bit in my family tree )

Historians, dust off your notes and books and show yourselves!

Good question. Will be keen to keep an eye on this thread if anyone has any insight to this.

I have a friend that just tried straight shaving this past Saturday for the first time... He ended up buying a straight from me because he loved it so much, and for the exact reasons you stated, being a Black man he said his face never felt as smooth, and with no irritation...I am hoping to see him join SRP as soon as he gets back home...I definitely gave him the web site...

Was much of anything marketed to minorities "back then?"

I'm not sure, I am not much of a student of marketing. Speaking of my own experiences perusing my great grandmothers collection of turn-of-the-century/early 20th century magazines such as Vanity Fair, the Saturday Evening Post, etc, the only blacks or other minorities that I remember seeing in them were as caricatures used in the marketing for certain products.

I would assume that an assumption was probably made that most minorities did not possess the disposable income to afford to purchase magazines and newspapers where most ads would be seen nor the literacy necessary to read them not to mention the funds necessary to procure the non-essential items that are marketed in genera.

While I doubt that there was ever much direct marketing of razors to minorities it would be fascinating to see razor marketing from the heyday of the straight in any form... do people collect it?

I don't know exactly how it was marketed but in Vietnam, being a French colony, is very heavily influenced in French/European culture. From the stories that my Grandpa told me, the more you were well off back in the day, the more European you were influenced. He'd use a straight razor for most of his life or went to the barber on a consistent basis because he could afford it.

When I went to Vietnam for the first time on vacation last year, what surprised me were that there were still many Barbershops overthere catering only to men and shaving with straight razors (disposable razors). I got a haircut and shave there and it was truly amazing and dirt cheap thanks to the exchange rate.

One of the best things my Grandpa told me was that "there are no good barbershops here (in America) nowadays, It should take 30 minutes or more with the barber meticulously cutting to detail" . Luckily I found a couple Gentleman's barbershops near me that still hold on to that ethos.

Straights back in the day were just marketed to "men". There was never any mention of race or nationality. I have seen some old ads and they were pretty generic.

I've had the opportunity to flip through 19th century department store catalogues, and back then they really didn't print advertisements like they do today. They didn't have group pictures of people using or wearing products, generally; basically, the catalogues were like phone books: entirely alphabetical in their arrangement, and black and white all the way through. They usually included small pictures in limited detail (again, in black and white) of the products, especially if they offered an assortment of subtly different makes or models. For example, in the "razors" section (the "straight" was not included in those days) they would quite often show a little graphic of the different grinds, from wedge to quarter-hollow, to full-hollow, etc.

They would also list strops, sometimes with a few pictures, and included a few hones.

On the whole, I was struck by how these types of advertisements (what the average person would be exposed to) did not really seek to lure any particular demographic, but rather listed their inventory as essentials that the average person, regardless of race, would need. You'd see razors, horse bridles and saddles, farm equipment and household wares like we see today. Just your basic stuff.

Shaving has always been a common thing, and in that era, things were not as mass produced as they were at the turn of the 20th century, when we evolved (or devolved) into a disposable society. On the whole, razor manufacturers did not exclusively make razors - they were generally "cutlers," who, like Wade and Butcher, Henckel or Brooksbanks, for example, made everything from table services to chisels, to tea sets.