Max Factor
Max Factor was born in Lodz, Russia, in 1877. At the age of 14 he
became an apprentice to a wig maker. At 20, he was running his own
makeup shop.
In 1904, Factor brought his family to America for the St, Louis
World's Fair, and they never left. First, Factor opened a cosmetics
shop in St. Louis, but the motion picture industry, then beginning in
Hollywood, beckoned. Factor moved to California and got a job with the
Pantages Theatre.
Max Factor
By 1914, he was perfecting makeup for the movies. He found that die
grease paint used in the theatre looked dreadful on screen, so he
improvised. He created false eyelashes, the eyebrow pencil, lip gloss,
and pancake makeup. Of course, once they had been made to look so
stylish on screen, actresses wanted to maintain that allure off
camera, so they wore the makeup in personal appearances.
It was not long before non-actresses were asking for the makeup so
that they too could look glamorous. It was in 1927 that Max Factor
introduced his first cosmetics to be sold to non-theatrical consumers.
Before Max Factor, few women used cosmetics. Factor popularized both
the word "makeup" and the wearing of the stuff.
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