by Rebel Girls
“Madam C. J. Walker’s Wonderful Hair Grower is a Miracle!” read the headline of a local newspaper. “Ladies are showing each other how to depend on themselves!”
~
Unfortunately for Annie Turnbo, Sarah was much better at selling herself and her products. Even though their products were similar, black women were drawn to Madam C. J. Walker and the stories she told.
Sarah wasn’t shy. She told everyone who she was and where she came from. “I was a washerwoman, and look at me now!” she always said.
Absolutely everybody was talking about Madam C. J. Walker. Her newspaper ads, presentations, workshops, and word-of-mouth advertising worked wonders for her business. But they worked a little too well. Charles and Lelia couldn’t get the orders out fast enough!
“Good morning, Mama,” Lelia yawned, coming down late to breakfast one morning.
“Aw, baby. You look like you were up half the night!” Sarah clucked her tongue in sympathy as she passed her daughter a plate of biscuits and bacon.
“I was up half the night,” Lelia grumbled.
“We’re two hundred orders behind,” Charles called from his desk in the next room, flipping through a tall stack of papers. “We’ve got plenty of business, but we might start losing it soon if we can’t deliver. See this here? The West Coast orders are taking too long to ship from the East Coast. People are starting to complain.”
“Don’t worry.” Sarah stood behind her husband and squeezed his shoulder. She pointed to a very big number. “Look! We’ve got the money to keep our distribution center in the east and open our very own factory, beauty college, and salon. We just need a new location.”
In 1910, Sarah opened the Madam C. J. Walker Manufacturing Company in Indianapolis, Indiana, smack-dab in the Midwest. A few tears of joy escaped her eyes as she held her husband’s and Lelia’s hands. The jingling keys opening the doors of her own building was one of the most satisfying sounds she had ever heard.
CHAPTER NINE
Sarah woke at dawn each day. She had a huge business to run and many employees to manage. Dozens of women sold her hair products door to door. Dozens more mixed the products, packaged them, and mailed them out to Madam C. J. Walker hair salons all over the country.
First, Sarah went to the laboratory to supervise the production of her hair mixture.
“More violet oil,” she instructed the workers, dipping her finger into a batch to check if it was up to her standards.
Next, she went to the salon where she greeted the shampoo girls folding towels near the washing station and hair stylists rinsing hot combs. Customers started arriving at 6:00 a.m. sharp and did not stop coming until well after dark. Charles often stopped by to bring Sarah a small bowl of cornbread and beans, but she usually didn’t have time to eat more than a spoonful.
When the day was over, Sarah’s feet throbbed and her back ached. She eased herself into a salon chair as one of her employees swept up.
“This place sure was hopping today!” Lelia said, pulling up a chair beside her mother.
Sarah agreed and frowned, thinking about doing it all over again the next day. “We’re going to need to hire a few new shampoo girls and stylists. I wonder if we could fit another chair over there . . . ”
“Annie’s opening a shop nearby,” Lelia groaned, kicking off her shoes. “Are we gonna pick up and move again?”
“Absolutely not.” Sarah waved the thought away. “I’ll lower my prices. She can’t compete with fifty cent scalp treatments and twenty-five cent shampoos! We can add some extra services for nails and skin.”
“Take a break from all your genius work. I’ve come to escort y’all home for dinner.” Charles stood in the doorway, grinning at them. He propped open the door to let some of the heat waft out onto the street.
The cool night air felt good on Sarah’s cheeks, and she couldn’t help but feel thankful.
Sarah was grateful to her husband for sharing the burden of the business with her, giving presentations in nearby towns. She was proud of Lelia, too, for keeping up business on the East Coast. And she was prouder still of all she had built.
~
When Sarah stepped into her shop a few weeks later, it looked and felt like a spa. The cracked vinyl floor was new and sparkling. Comfy leather seats and fluffy pillows replaced the worn wooden chairs in the waiting room. A greeter offered lemonade and cookies to clients.
Sarah straightened the sign at the nail salon station offering hand massages. The soft scent of shampoo and lotion mixed with the sharper scent of nail polish and steaming hot combs.
Sarah had hired enough people that she did not need to work in the salon. She no longer feared Annie running her out of town either. She remembered doors being slammed in her face when she first started out, and hunching over the kitchen table in her cream-splattered apron. She breathed a huge sigh of relief that those days were over.
This is what success feels like, Sarah thought. Madam C. J. Walker is here to stay.
“Madam?” asked a small voice.
“Yes?” Sarah looked down at a girl who couldn’t have been more than eight years old. “What’s your name, sweetheart?”
“I, um, uh . . . B-b-belinda.” The girl stammered so much the words came out all smooshed together. “D-d-daddy can’t work, and I’m h-hungry. M-m-mama said you have errands sometimes.”
“Well,” Sarah said slowly, “I suppose I do. Now take a deep breath and try again. Do you have a question for me?”
Belinda did what Sarah asked, looking her right in the eye. “You got any errands for me, Madam C. J. Walker?”
Sarah smiled and quickly scribbled a short list. She pressed a shiny silver dollar to Belinda’s palm along with a scrap of paper. “Why don’t you run on down to the store and get me these things? You can keep the change.”
“Thank you Madam Walker,” Belinda squeaked. She scampered out the door.
~
Sarah gave and gave to the people around her. At holidays, she handed out whole turkeys and baskets of squash and potatoes. When black people were turned away from white hotels, she opened her home to them. She hired as many shampoo and errand girls, factory workers, and Walker Agents as she could. But no matter what she did, it never seemed to be enough. Poor black people were suffering everywhere she looked.
Sarah set her sights higher. She wanted to put her money where it would impact the entire community all at once.
One morning, Sarah read a newspaper story about a local community organization. In it, the editor George Knox wrote: “The YMCA building is going to pieces. Other cities have raised money to build their own centers. We can do it, too. Give what you can to this charitable cause!”
The Young Men’s Christian Association (YMCA) helped people in need. Men and boys could sleep there if they had no place to stay. They could take job training classes and play sports. There was even a small shop where they could work for nickels and dimes. But the building was old, and there weren’t enough rooms to go around.
Why doesn’t something like this exist for black girls? Sarah wondered.
After reading the story, she marched right into George’s office. It reminded her of her husband’s newspaper office back in St. Louis, but messier. Scattered papers coated the floor and broken pens were rolled into corners.
“I want to get involved in the YMCA project. What can I do?” Sarah asked over the sounds of clacking typewriters.
George stared at her in shock. He had no idea what to say to a woman who wanted to support a men-only organization. But he pointed her in the right direction.
The male committee members of the YMCA politely declined Sarah’s request to join the organization or sit in on planning meetings.
“Women need not concern themselves with matters of finance,” said one board member. “What did you say your business was again?”
“It’s hair, sir,” said the note-taker.
Sarah stood up and saw herself out because they all seemed to be laug
hing at her. This, she would not stand.
On the very last day of the fundraiser, Madam C. J. Walker pledged a thousand dollars to rebuild the YMCA. Again, George Knox’s eyes widened in surprise. He pulled out his notebook for a story that was already forming in his mind.
“You’re pretty successful for a lady,” George said.
Sarah stiffened, her expression sour.
“What’s your secret?” His pen hovered above a blank piece of paper, waiting for her answer.
She thought about it for a moment, then said, “I believe in black women.”
As she walked away from him, her mind was already working. She wanted, no, she needed to gain the business community’s respect. And she thought she knew just how to do it.
CHAPTER TEN
Madam C. J. Walker arrived in Chicago riding in her very own Ford Model T car. She wore her best skirt and jacket, made of the finest, softest wool, and a pair of shiny black shoes. After a determined press of her lips, she straightened her fabulous hat with its gigantic feather.
“Pull right up to the front, William,” she ordered her driver.
“Yes, ma’am,” William replied. He hurried around the side of the car and tipped his hat to her as he opened her door. Sarah strode purposefully up the front steps and into the building under a sign that read: “National Negro Business League.”
The founder of the league, Booker T. Washington, was the most influential black businessman in America. Booker had access to powerful people from educators to the president of the United States. He encouraged black men to start their own businesses and gave workshops about how to run a company. If anyone could help Sarah find the respect she’d earned, she decided, it would be him.
Sarah had written to Booker many times, but each time he’d replied with a short rejection. She’d sent him her company brochures, showed up at his conferences, and requested to be a featured speaker. But he always refused to let Sarah on stage.
Then Booker did something that made her furious. He invited several other hair culturists to speak at the Chicago conference but not Madam C. J. Walker, the most successful of them all.
“I cannot believe this man!” Sarah said, hands shaking when she found out.
Rather than ask Booker’s permission to attend the conference, Sarah called her editor friend, George, who happened to be there that weekend. “All I need you to do is introduce me. I’ll do the rest.”
When the time came, George stood up and began to introduce her. But Booker cut him off before he finished. Sarah knew it was now or never.
“Surely you are not going to shut the door in my face,” Madam C. J. Walker said loudly as she climbed onto the stage. “I know you don’t feel that my business is worthy of your time. But it is. I went into a business that everybody said was impossible: the business of growing hair. Nobody believed it could be done, but I have proven that it can!”
The whole room broke into applause. But Booker stood unmoved.
Sarah’s voice grew louder. “I came from the cotton fields of the South. I was promoted from there to the washtub. Then to the kitchen. And from there I promoted myself into the manufacturing business. I have built my own factory on my own ground. I am not ashamed of my roots, and they don’t make me any less of a lady. I know how to grow hair as well as I know how to grow cotton.”
She gazed out at a sea of faces. They looked back at her, nearly all of them male. Most of them looked amused, but some seemed angry that a woman had taken over the stage to talk about something as silly as hair.
Sarah took a deep breath and went on to reveal her sales numbers, the number of people she employed, the size of her factory, and her expected profits for the coming year. The faces below changed from irritated to incredulous.
There was more applause, louder this time, but Sarah didn’t want people to clap for her. She wanted them to listen.
“Let me speak!” she said, aiming her next comment straight at Booker T. Washington. “My goal is not simply to dress up and drive around in nice cars. I plan to provide opportunities for black people!”
Rather than comment on Sarah’s remarks, Booker called the next presenter onto the stage, as if Sarah had not said a word. Sarah was disappointed by Booker’s reaction, but from the audience’s applause she knew she had done what she came to do.
Madam C. J. Walker was well on her way to earning the respect she deserved.
CHAPTER ELEVEN
William turned the car up the long road that led to the cabin Sarah had once called home. A trail of dust rose like smoke behind the wheels. All around were fields of cotton, like a sea of tiny white clouds.
The sight took Sarah right back to when she was a little girl. She remembered how she’d run through the rows chasing after Louvenia. Papa hoisted the overstuffed bags of cotton onto his shoulders. Over on the porch, Mama hummed her favorite gospel as she tucked fabric over her hair. Her three brothers, Alexander, James, and Owen, dangled their legs off the side of a rickety wooden porch.
Tears welled in Sarah’s eyes as the memories overtook her.
“Ma’am?” William asked, stopping the car.
Sarah dabbed at her eyes. “I’m all right.” She gave William a reassuring smile. “Drive around back. My mother and father are buried behind the house, and I’d like to leave a few flowers for them.”
She didn’t linger. Being there felt like a step back in time, where hands deliberately held her back.
On the drive out of town, Sarah read what the local papers had written about her visit. A white-owned paper had gotten it all wrong. They’d called her “Winnie” instead of Sarah, and referred to her as a “negress” who was “quiet and unassuming.” Worst of all, they said that she specialized in straightening hair instead of growing it.
Sarah tossed the paper onto the seat beside her. She was glad to leave her hometown behind. She didn’t have time for small-minded people. Besides, she had work to do thinking up new products, recruiting and training Walker Agents, giving lectures on hair styling at black colleges, and sharing her story with women everywhere.
But all the travel had started to wear on her. Sarah didn’t want to admit it, but she felt tired. She was dizzy, too, with frequent headaches.
“I don’t know what’s come over me lately,” she said to William as they stopped by a set of train tracks. “Maybe I’m not getting enough . . . ”
Sarah’s words trailed off seeing a man on the other side of the tracks, yelling and waving his arms. She couldn’t hear what he was saying but there was terror in his eyes. A frantic train whistle made her jump.
Sarah spun around just in time to see a freight train hurtling right toward them! She screamed as William stepped on the gas. The car jerked forward so fast that his hat flew off his head. The train missed the car by inches.
Sarah and William barely escaped with their lives.
Even though she was out of danger, Sarah’s heart wouldn’t slow down. In the days that followed, Sarah’s dizziness and headaches got worse, so she visited the doctor.
“Madam Walker, I must insist that you cancel your lecture series,” the doctor told her. “You need no less than six weeks rest.”
Sarah assured her doctor she would follow his advice. She checked herself into a spa in Arkansas where the hot springs were believed to have magical powers. Twice a day Sarah wrapped herself in soft, fluffy robes and walked to the healing springs. As she sat in the warm water, she could feel her muscles loosening. Stress seemed to seep out of her pores.
~
Though Sarah did relax for a few weeks, she decided she couldn’t slow down. Not just yet.
Lelia bought a townhouse in Harlem, New York City. In 1913, Harlem was a hub of black culture bustling with restaurants, clubs, and gorgeous houses.
Meanwhile, Sarah and Charles had been spending more and more time apart. After Sarah returned to Indianapolis, they decided to divorce. So when Lelia established the Lelia College of Beauty Culture and the Walker Hair Parlour in t
he heart of Harlem, she began pestering her mother to move there.
New York was the biggest city Sarah had ever seen, with sweeping gardens and giant fountains and buildings so tall they seemed to scrape the sky. Instead of streetcars, the avenues hummed with underground trains. Each time she visited her daughter, Sarah thought the move seemed like a better and better idea. It still took three years for Lelia to convince her. But, after taking a look at the rising sales numbers from the East Coast, opening a second headquarters in New York City made sense.
In 1916, Sarah left Indianapolis behind and moved in with Lelia.
One morning, Sarah stood over the stove in Lelia’s kitchen and dropped four pieces of bacon in the cast iron skillet. The bacon crackled and popped as the heat drew out the meat’s grease.
Sarah filled a plate with her daughter’s favorites: homemade rolls, honey, scrambled eggs, grits, bacon, a glass of orange juice, and two peppermint sticks.
For so long, Sarah had been busy traveling, giving lectures, and growing her business. She’d even begun partnering with groups like the NAACP to work on anti-lynching efforts. Today, she decided, would be devoted to Lelia.
I wish Moses was here to see all this, Sarah thought, remembering life with Lelia’s father. Smiling, she headed to Lelia’s room.
“Good morning, baby,” Sarah said, as she set the breakfast tray on the bedside table.
“Good morning, Mama. Or should I say Madam Mama?”
“Hush, child.”
“I’m glad you’re home, Mama,” Lelia said, laughing as she picked up a peppermint stick. “What are these for?”
“To remind you how sweet life is when we’re together,” Sarah replied. She took the other stick and sucked on the end. “Now, eat your food. I have a surprise for you.”
That afternoon the two got dressed in their finest and went to Tiffany’s, the famous jewelry store. There, a saleswoman showed Lelia and Sarah diamond necklaces, rings, bracelets, and earrings in a private room.
