Madam C.J. Walker
- Hayeon Kwak
- Jul 14, 2024
- 3 min read
Updated: Jul 16, 2024
"I am a woman who came from the cotton fields of the South. From there I was promoted to the washtub. From there I was promoted to the cook kitchen. And from there I promoted myself into the business of manufacturing hair goods and preparations….I have built my own factory on my own ground.”
From a mistreated orphan to an untouchable millionaire entrepreneur, Madam C.J Walker’s life is an empowering underdog story too often forgotten in history. Madam C.J Walker was born Sarah Breedlove to two recently freed Louisiana sharecroppers, Owen and Minerva, after the Emancipation Proclamation. She was the first in her family to be born free.
Madam C.J Walker’s life was full of tragedy from the very beginning– she was orphaned at the young age of seven and was sent to live with her sister Louvinia in Mississippi, where she worked as a cotton-picker. To escape the abuse from her brother-in-law Jesse Powell, she married at the early age of 14 to Moses McWilliams but was widowed as a single 20-year-old mother with a 2-year-old A’Leila.
When the world seemed determined to put her at every disadvantage, Walker gave herself her start and moved to St. Louis with her daughter, where she worked as a laundress during the day and went to school at night. Walker finally established a hard-earned balance in life, earning $1.50 a day as a washerwoman which was enough to send her daughter to the public school, and marrying Charles J. Walker.
However, in her 20s during the 1980s, Walker developed a scalp ailment, causing her to lose most of her hair. She struggled to find shampoos and treatments for her hair, researching with her brothers and experimenting with Annie Malone, another black woman entrepreneur. Years later, Malone would hire Walker as a commission agent for her hair-care product company, and Walker and her family would move to Denver, Colorado.
Walker sold her products directly to black women, developing a personal bond with her customers as she demonstrated how the “Walker Method” was cultivated for black hair. She soon amassed a large market of black customers after treatment demonstrations in churches, lodges, and door-to-door selling. Through her loyal customers, Walker expanded her business, hiring saleswomen she called “beauty culturalists” to promote her business and products to even more people.
In 1905, Walker moved her products, the Wonderful Hair Grower, Glossine, and Vegetable Shampoo, to a factory in Pittsburgh named after her daughter. She left her branch in Pittsburgh to Leila and moved her booming business headquarters to Indianapolis, a hub for transportation and an even greater African American population.
With her newfound fortune, Madam C.J. Walker became “the first Black woman millionaire in America.” Just as the Black public embraced her as an inspiring figure, Walker gave back to her community of African Americans. She promoted Black women’s empowerment, establishing Alice Kelly, her former schoolteacher, as the overseer of the factory in Indianapolis, contributing thousands of dollars to Black scholarships and political organizations such as the NAACP and the Black YMCA.
When asked about the secret behind her success, Walker replied, “There is no royal flower-strewn path to success. And if there is, I have not found it for if I have accomplished anything in life it is because I have been willing to work hard.” Through her actions, Madam C.J Walker empowers others in her “rags-to-riches” ascent to become their fairy godmother and write their happy ending.
Written by: Hayeon Kwak
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