Category: Hair

I Kissed Seven Girls And I Liked It

Life: Our Finest Hour
Life: Our Finest Hour

Here’s some morale for the troops! LIFE asked Ginger Rogers (not shown here) to give a dream party to a GI, and the lucky recipient was the lipstick-covered Private John Farnsworth. The 22-year-old Farnsworth had served three years in the Pacific during WWII and returned home in 1944 to recover from malaria. After lunch, dancing, and games, the women sent him on his way–with a story to tell his buddies.

Women shown above include: Barbara Hale, Lynne Baggett, Gloria DeHaven, Lynn Bari, Jinx Falkenburg, Dolores Moran, and Chili Williams.

Talk about your day in the sun!

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Hey, Won’t You Play

74 El Rancho
74 El Rancho

Bill (KTAI’s “Mr. Music”) Vessey of Texas A&I University in Kingsville shows us how a stray lock of hair pulled in front of the headset makes for a fantastic fringey sideburn.

Cripple Creek Pre-Hipster Barbershop ‘Staches

Life 08-22-55
Life 08-22-55

What is going on here? Guests of the melodrama Flying Scud were given cardboard mustaches upon admission to the basement theater of Cripple Creek, Colorado’s Imperial Hotel. Once disguised, they were encouraged to jeer at the villain as he tried to sully the honor of an innocent maiden. In that 1955 season, more than 20,000 people donned faux ‘staches in those seats.

The theater closed in the early 1990s when the Imperial was converted to a casino. The theater, however was left intact in the basement of the hotel, and in 2009, life was restored to the Imperial, including the Gold Bar Theater. Perhaps you could find yourselves seated at one of those checkered tablecloths, too!

Every Last One Bobbed

1926 Pine Burr
1926 Pine Burr Football Sponsor and her maids

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From what I gather, a “sponsor” was like the head of the pep squad. Betty Greer (“origin of the pep”) had maids, all with modern bobbed hair. But it doesn’t sound like she sponsored in the sense of providing funds. Although–props for your nice pearls and mink stole, Betty. PineBurr1926--025

And here are the boys for whom they cheered. These youthful guys, born at the turn of the century, long gone.

PineBurr1926--027Most of their kids are probably gone, too. But Berton’s hair lives on forever.

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Brow Be Gone

Western Hills High School, Ft Worth, TX
Western Hills High School, Ft Worth, TX

In the late 1970s, the powers that be decided that foreheads were only useful as a canvas to showcase bangs, and forehead skin should be hidden altogether. By the fall of 1979, most hip teens had followed suit and were ready freddy for school picture day.

Even Caucasion afros came forward. Baby, you make my love come down.

Often, blond boys were indistinguishable from blond girls.

Then there’s this style, which would later morph into the “He wants you, too, Malachi” style from Children of the Corn.

Fashion’s dictates did not exclude any creed nor color. Rules is rules.

This girl missed the memo. She thought Marcia Brady was still groovy. By January, she was being homeschooled.

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Judge Reinhold got the memo, but he got it late. Bless his heart.

Catamount80033Covered foreheads made dudes look hot, like poor men’s Oak Ridge Boys. How did the ladies ever decide upon a suitor?

Coveted styles included The Future Domestic Violencer, The Camaro On Blocks, and The 7-11 Graveyard Shift.

But if the goal was to entirely cover the forehead, to the extent that one’s eyesight was in peril, then there could only be one victor. Steve Wagner, you were that man.

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Before The Rise Of Red Solo Cup

Cactus76RoundUp
Univ of Tx 1976

It’s hard to believe this was nearly 40 years ago. Two score years ago. Red Solo Cups had only just come out and were not yet the popular beverage container you see on late night talk show beer pong tournaments. Mexican dresses, big sunglasses, and scalp-hugging hair were in. The drinking age was 18. And yet, in this bright color, it doesn’t look that long ago at all.

Too Much Powdering Your Nose

Sooner64PanhellenicCouncil033

I love this image. The little collars and cardigans, skirts and mod flips, the coiled phone cord, the more mature, white-nosed woman whose fingers cover the “ic” so that it reads just Panhellen. I like to think that’s her name. Panhellen. Brilliant!