Majorie Joyner (1896-1994)

We have a very interesting story about a beautician that created the worlds only "Permanent Wave Machine"; Majorie Joyner

"Marjorie Stewart Joyner was one such woman. A granddaughter of a slave and a white slave-owner, she was born on October 24, 1896 in Monterey, Virginia, in the Blue Ridge Mountains area of the state. She moved to Chicago in 1912, and shortly thereafter, she began studying cosmetology. In 1916, she became the first African American graduate of Chicago's A.B. Molar Beauty School. That year, at the age of 20, she married podiatrist Robert E. Joyner and opened her salon.

Walker died in 1919, and a year later, Joyner joined Madame C.J. Walker Beauty Colleges as the national supervisor. In this position, Joyner oversaw more than 200 beauty schools.

A few years later, Joyner came up with a groundbreaking device of her own, the permanent wave machine. At the time, African American women were accustomed to straightening their hair using very hot curling irons. The process was very slow and uncomfortable because only one iron would be used at a time. Joyner thought that there must be a way to improve upon this.

Joyner’s invention was readily adopted by salons, which were able to help both black and white clients to straighten or curl their hair.  Joyner didn’t receive any substantial compensation for her invention, but she has said that this never bothered her. She continued to break ground in the beauty industry, co-founding the United Beauty School Owners and Teachers Association in 1945. That year, she also founded the Alpha Chi Pi Omega Sorority and Fraternity to help raise professional standards for beauticians. At the age of 77, she decided to go to college. In 1973, she was awarded a bachelor's degree in psychology from Bethune-Cookman College in Daytona Beach, FL"

Reference

Lemelson-MIT