Kansas City journal. [volume] (Kansas City, Mo.) 1897-1928, 1899-01-25
HUMAN HAIR SELLS WELL.
About Five Tons Used Annually by
London Merchants-The Limo
ges Hair Market.

From the London Mail
All previous records in prices paid for
human hair have been broken by the sum
just realized for a lock from the head of
Edward ".
Eight guineas was the sum paid for this
scrap of hair. and this works out at over
91,000 for the whole hirsute covering of
that monarch's head.
As a small portion of the beard of George
Ill. only fetched 81 Is shilings. it would
appear that relics of the victor OF Tewks-
bury and Barnet are in greater demand
than those of the Georgian monarch.
1t is recorded that in the ages past
certain Countess of Suffolk was forced to
sell her beautiful hair for G20 in order to
provide repast wherewith to regale some
notable friends; also that an Oxford girl.
being unable to raise Eoo to provide herself
with dowry, came up to London and sold
her hair at e3 an ounce, and returned to
her native village bearing $50 with her.
with which money she bought her
a husband
1t is calculated that something like five
don merchants in hair and although sam
pies arrive from various parts of the world.
the bulk l!s, is chiefly French or Italian grown.
one of the great events of the year. Then
the young, peasant girls, blessed with
of selling their wigs to the highest bidder
returning home again with pomatum ga
lore for the purpose of cultivatinS the fol-
the average price was as high as 60 Kill.
ogram or. about 1ss pound. but. alas!
| this is only just about one-half what it
was In the palmy days of the chignon.
| Naturally the tresses of novices who take
| the veil figure largely in the hair harvest.
| Some little time ago a convent is said to
have sold over ton of human hair for
G4,VO or Is. Sd. per ounce, while single
convent near Tours recently dispatched as
much as eighty pounds of hair to Per-
| sian hairdresser, which would be worth
| almost as many sovereigns.
AS the aforementioned weight represents
| the locks of 800 novices which gives each
on an average AZ ounces. it Is very obvious
| the professional hair cultivators of the
| Haute Vienne. who can sometimes obtain
| So for their locks.
| A recent interview with a native mer-
| chant revealed the fact that E4 los was
an average price for an English girls head
of hair.
| Hair which is worth about shilling an
| ounce when it is but eight inches long
| increases in value as it increases in
| length until it rises to as much as 30s per
ounce. providing the original owner is liv-
ing. For the long hair which as rule
| AT the international exposition of 1862
| there was shown specimen Of jet-black
! hair measuring the extraordinary length
| of seventy-four inches. George Catlin one
| of the first authorities on the North Amer
| lean Indian. records that chief of the
Crow tribe possesses hair ten feet and
| seven inches long.
In Melbourne recently. however, a lee
turer quoted the case of woman whose
| hair had grown TO eighteen feet. and was
''habitua1ly used as a bed quilt by its
| owner winter nights"
| This gifted lady could make good liv-
| ing in London by advertising the virtues
| of one of the many hair restorers