"The Sharecropper’s Daughter Who Made Black Women Proud of Their Hair"

"A’Lelia Bundles, Madam Walker’s great-great-granddaughter, helped uncover Walker’s unique legacy in her detailed biography, On Her Own Ground: The Life and Times of Madam C. J. Walker, which was published in 2001. The title of Bundles’ book was pulled from one of Walker’s famous statements about her journey from poverty to success: “I am a woman who came from the cotton fields of the South. From there I was promoted to the washtub. From there I was promoted to the cook kitchen. And from there I promoted myself into the business of manufacturing hair goods and preparations. I have built my own factory on my own ground.”...

One of the earliest and best-known businesses to make hair products explicitly for African Americans was run by Rebecca Elliott. During the 1880s, Elliott’s concoctions often relied on the not-so-subtle implication that the most desirable hair belonged to white people: Her Nutritive Pomade supposedly made hair “soft, straight and silky,” and one of the company’s most expensive products was Cheveline, a hair-straightening formula. In contrast, Sarah’s focus was on growing healthier hair and the financial opportunities this might provide for herself and others...

“She was very masterful at using the media; she bought ads in black newspapers all over the country,” Bundles says. “Moving to Indianapolis was strategic, in that it was the crossroads of America, and all the trains passing through meant that it was very easy to ship her products. Indianapolis also had three black newspapers, so the black Pullman porters on all those trains going through would pick up these papers and sell them in places like Boston, San Francisco, Detroit, or Atlanta.” As her network of sales agents increased and profits continued to grow, Walker also hired two young attorneys and drafted the articles of incorporation for her company, with the corporation’s initial capital stock worth $10,000.

Once in Indianapolis, Walker continued her tradition of social philanthropy, getting more involved with the National Association of Colored Women (NACW) and donating $1,000 for a new “colored YMCA” project, a huge sum at the time. “I think that contribution was critical for raising her profile,” Bundles says. “It became this great inspirational narrative of a woman who had worked as a washer woman and now had given a thousand dollars to the YMCA—that really catapulted her. Madam Walker moved beyond just being a person who was good at selling hair-care products; she realized her power to use these resources for social, cultural, and political causes.”"

http://msmagazine.com/blog/2015/09/09/the-sharecroppers-daughter-who-made-black-women-proud-of-their-hair/