The amount of mustaches, beards, chops, side burns, soul patches, and even the occasional neck beard at the National Archives requires its own category. This is it.
These might look like two gentlemen out for a stroll in the early twentieth century, but the well-bearded gentlemen on the right is William Duncan, founder of Metlakahtla, a Utopian community. The man on the left with the mustache is Sir Henry S. Wellcome, who founded the pharmaceutical company Burroughs Wellcome & Company, which later became … Continue reading Facial Hair Friday: Utopia above the Lower 48
Did you catch Mugged! Facing Life at Leavenworth at the National Archives at Kansas City this summer? The exhibit may be closed now, but you can learn more about the prison, its inmates, and its records in this new article from Prologue. And it's not too late to see some more mug shots from the exhibits. Check … Continue reading You can grow a mustache, but you can never leave
It's a nineteenth-century twist on six degrees of separations--except Gen. Gouverneur K. Warren isn't connected to Kevin Bacon. Along with his mustache and soul patch, he's two degrees of separation from the Brooklyn Bridge. Warren was one of 12 children. His sister Emily came to visit him at his headquarter when he was commanding the Fifth … Continue reading Facial Hair Friday: The Brooklyn Bridge
Walt Whitman, ca. 1860-ca. 1865 (111-B-2245). Song of My Beard (with apologies to the original Whitman poem!) 1. I celebrate my beard, and sing my beard, And what I grow you shall grow For every follicle belonging to me as good as belongs to you. I loafe and stroke my beard I lean and stroke … Continue reading Facial Hair Friday: Sounding the bearded YAWP
It's Facial Hair Friday, and it's been a scorching week in Washington, DC, at the National Archives. It's going to reach 100 degrees today. So what can you do to cool off? Perhaps you should gaze upon the fulsome beard of General David A. Russell of the Union Army. Do you have such a long, rippling … Continue reading Hottest Beard on Record
In honor of Bastille Day earlier this week, we present a French "moustache." This moustache decorates the face of General Giraud, here seen out walking in the gardens of the cliffside fortress Konigstein, where he was held as a POW by the Germans. He was captured in May of 1940 and escaped two years later. … Continue reading Facial Hair Friday: Daring escapes from Nazi prisons!
Today's Facial Hair Friday is not a case of mistaken identity. Jefferson Davis was arrested for murder. But this Jefferson Davis was not the president of the Confederate States. This one was a Union officer, with nearly the same name. Jefferson Columbus Davis was a brigadier general in the Union Army when he shot and … Continue reading Facial Hair Friday: A bushy beard, a murder, and a missing arm
In the Facial Hair Friday spotlight today is a man with a truly impressive set of whiskers. Norton P. Chipman also has a fascinating story to go behind that beard. Chipman was born in 1834 in Ohio, later lived in Iowa, and joined the Union Army after finishing law school. He didn’t spend the entire … Continue reading Facial Hair Friday: Boldly going where no beard has gone before
It's Friday, and it's time for facial hair! But it's not entirely clear if Col. Howe qualifies, as his "beard" seems to extend upwards from his neck, skipping his chin entirely. What do you think?
With his goatee and mustache, photographer Mathew Brady himself is an excellent addition to Facial Hair Fridays. In fact, he is the reason we have so many follicle follies to celebrate. There are 6,066 photographs by Brady and his associates in the National Archives collections. Many of the images we’ve looked at and been inspired … Continue reading Facial Hair Friday: Tribute to Mathew Brady
