Edwardian Women In Science: Hairdressing The False Hair Milkmaid Crown Braid

Lacking sufficient hair to Milkmaid Braid Your Hair, like Margaret Foster, "Uncle Sam's only woman chemist," (above) in 1919, I'm on the hunter-gatherer for fake hair braided into a crown braid like a headband that I can slip over my shaggy short no-style and voila, just like an Edwardian Belle Epoque woman of science.


Edwardian hair: "pile it high and deep."

If you ever thought all that Gibson girl hair was real, see John Woodforde's The Strange History of False Hair:

They used rats.

[Gibson girl hair tutorial. Sans rat.]

Fascinating reads are: Secrecy, shame, and Victorian wigs and gender and the rise of the female expert during the Belle Epoque and "Women's Work" in Science: 1880-1910 by American historian of science Margaret W. Rossiter who coined the term "the Matilda effect," a bias against acknowledging the achievements of woman scientists, whose work has been attributed to their male colleagues."

Of course, you know me, I'm the kind of person who nicknames everything; my fake news 19th century women in science cosplay hair-braid headband is Matilda.







Photo credits:

Library of Congress, Prints and Photographs Division, Washington D.C. npcc 00520 http://hdl.loc.gov/loc.pnp/npcc.00520
1873. Revue de la mode. Details d’une coiffure en cheveux. Modéles de la maison Philippe et Cº, 15, rue Royale.