Evening star. [volume] (Washington, D.C.) 1854-1972, 1906-11-28
DANGERS IN SHAVING.
Attentions to Which a Physician Al
WAYS Firmly Objects.

''There seems to be considerable diversity
of opinion on the part of the boss BARRIERS
of the capital as to the price of a shave or
a hair cut" remarked smoothly shaved
man, land as to whether there shall be an
extra charge for shaving the neck and for
the use of a hot towel.
But there Is no diversity of opinion on
the part of men who are shaved by BARRIERS
that a few more arrests and fines of $40,
as was recently made in Georgetown, for
keeping shop in an insanitary condition,
will do more toward this needed reform
than tons of talk and moral suasion.
1T has always given me chill of horror,
perhaps because l am physician, to see
BARRIERS reach out for a needle lying on the
razor stand and calmly prick a pimple upon
the face of a man in the chair. Then they
will take a pair of small tweezers and
apply them to some portion of man s
face, perhaps in squeezing an eruption, or
elsewhere upon an open scratch or cut. But
the same old needle and tweezers are used
Just the same.
IF you have the hardihood to call to the
BARRIERS attention the deadly danger
You in establishment and reply that the
articles used are clean, and are wiped
of after each application. You see, the
barber. from his limited standpoint. pities
your ignorance and resents your implied
assertion that his articles not clean.
But the amazing part of 1t Is that men
submit to these hazardous facial manipula-
tons with complacency and as a matter
of course. 1t is past my individual under
standing. but you witness 1t every day in
barber shops in every city in the country.
Il is bad enough to go into the average
barber shop and be shaved by a razor
which in nine cases out of ten is merely
'~iped off on the shaving paper before 1t
is replaced in its sheath. This leaves out
entirely the fact that your face has had
preliminary scrubbing with soap and brush
which are used promiscuously upon other
faces. very often but imperfectly. rinsed
after the previous use.
Men should positively and firmly de-
cline these gratutious offices on the part
of BARRIERS and never under any circum-
stances permit the application to the face
OF any metal instrument except the razor
itself.
1T has likewise given me spasms of
horror to observe the tonsOrial artist
when cut in the skin is made by the
razor. or the cuticle surfaces are abrased,
or the apex of a pimple or other eruption
scraped, methodically reach for small or
large piece of alum, a stick of caustic,
and apply 1t to the cut abrasion to
heal or to stop the bleeding And it is
the same old piece of alum or stick of
caustic that goes on each and every face
though, of course, 1t is always Clean or
wiped off, and therefore harmless from
the BARRIERS standpoint.
And men foolishly take this application
of extraneous substances to the face as
they do the needle and the tweezers, as a
matter of course-and through habit and
long established custom though in some
instances they could with equal safety SUBJ
init to hypodermic injections of the virus
of one of several dangerous and infectious
diseases.
When youth. and long before began
the study of medicine, / never permitted
such applications to my face, and my re-
fusal In majority of cases has caused
mild or indignant protest on the part of
the learned razor-wielder. 1 have always
insisted, when a cut was developed, that
the clean end of towel soaked in hot
water be applied, and this Is bad enough
in itself under the circumstances.
Neither have l permitted BARRIERS to
apply after shaving the regulation and
ume-honored face wash of various mix
lures, ranging from diluted witch hazel to
what is claimed to be bay rum. This face
wash, comes also from the same old bot
tie applied by the same hand that has gone
over other faces. The application of the
scented water from bottles and the rubbing
OF the hair after a shave or O hair cut
largely tends to cause falling of the hair
and resultant ADMINISTRATORS have
rubbed countless men into badness by the
application for years of this alleged sweet
smelling mixture.
Where face powder is applied after a
shave on the end of q clean towel ii Is
not so bad as where piece of solid chalk
is rubbed upon the face. This Is likewise a
pernictous practice, for 1t Is the same old
piece of absorbent and holding material
that goes over all faces alike that come
into that particular shop-but it is clean
OF course, from the shaver's standpoint.
In short, as a physician, men who are
shaved In barber shops should as closely
as possible and quietly but emphatically
require the barber to cut out ali else es-
pecially the attentions to which L have
alluded"