AUTOBIOGRAPHY OF MAX FACTOR

Radio Record, Volume XIII, Issue 11, 21 August 1939, Page 25

AUTOBIOGRAPHY OF MAX FACTOR

Founder Of Hollywood’s Big "Temple Of Glamour" Tells How It Happened

N this exclusive series, speci‘ally written for ‘‘Record,’’ the world’s leading exponent | f make-up for stage, screen, and society tells how, beginning as a poor boy in Russia, ' he worked his way up ‘to controller of a great business. He gives us many tmtimate glimpses of Hollywood celebrities stripped of the glamour with which his own paint and powder have helped to endow them. S I sit here at my desk in the vast modern "building which bears my name-a building deseribed by many writers as Hollywood’s ‘‘Temple of Glam-our’’-thinking of the sereen celebrities who come to consult me daily, and the millions ef women all over the world whom I have helped to beautify, I can hardly believe that I am the same Max Factor who was born of a poor Russian family sixty-one years ago and who started work at the age of seven, selling oranges in a little theatre in Lodz. It occurs to me, with some surprise, that the story I have lived is as full of colour, comedy and drama as many I have seen on the screen. At any rate, it seems worth telling, and I hope I shall be able to make it worth reading.. August 5, 1877, was a momentous day for me, if not for my parents. Joseph Factor, my father, was a designer of cloth patterns in the mills, and my mother, Cecilia Toredowsky Factor, was a designer and weaver of handicraft tapestries. As they were not very well off, I do not imagine that the birth of a fifth child was much of an occasion for rejoicing. There were already three boys and one girl -‘sider than myself; as it turned out, there were six more to follow. It was not surprising that I was sent to work at an early age. Lodz, now an important industrial city in the re-created nation of Poland, was then just a part of the immense territories ruled over by Alexander the Second, Tsar of all the Russias. But it boasted several theatres, and, as there happened to be a slump in the cloth mills, it was to one of these, the Tsarina Theatre, that I was sent to sell nuts, sweets and fruit to the audiences, The money I earned was meagre, but my parents were glad of any extra pennies. It was particularly fortunate for me that circumstances compelled Ine «to embark on a_ theatrical eareer, for had I ever started work in the mills, like my brothers and sisters, I am almost sure my entire life would have been spent there. The year 1886 was a bad one for oranges, and many of my wares were frostbitten and unpalatable. My customers, in their frank Russian manner, showed their displeasure by hurling the offending fruit at the unoffending boy who had sold it to them, and I spent most of my time dodging oranges. Then came the first upward step in my career. Mixing with the supernumeraries of the theatre I

learnt that there was soon tl. be @ vacancy on the apprentice staff of the wigshop. I went straight "to the master wigmaker and persuaded him to take me on. Thus, at the age of eleven, I was signed as an apprentice, and legally bound to serve four years. I was to live in the quarters over the shop, along with seven other apprentices. The master was to provide us with food, one suit and one pair of shoes each year. We had no wages, but were permitted to accept tips-a privilege which proved very hollow, because the few customers who seemed even remotely affluent were invariably served by the master himself, Slavery [XN the Russia of the ’80’s the duties of the wigmaker covered a great deal more than his title would indicate. Besides making wigs, we were prepared to supply and apply make-up, trim or dye hair, wax moustaches, pull teeth, perform minor surgical operations, and even to leech an ailing customer. Leeching was one of our most profitable activities. This little worm, which rapidly and ravenously sucks blood from any living thing to which it is introduced, was the cure-all of the provincial districts of Europe during most of the nineteenth century. The letting of blood was supposed to be a ‘remedy for almost any ailment imaginable, and it was a standing joke among the apprentices that "the master would probably prescribe a leech for leprosy." The life of an apprentice was an exceptionally busy one. We arose at six in the morning, spent 20 minutes at breakfast, and then went immediately to the workrooms, where our tasks for the day were assigned to us. . On weekdays and Sundays we generally managed to finish the day’s work at anywhere from seven to ten o’lock in the evening. On Saturday nights, however, we Were very seldom able to retire before midnight or one o'clock, owing to the extra business that came from the socialites, both male and female, who wished to appear at primped perfection on Sunday. It was one mad rush of creating feminine coiffures, trimming men’s hair, and shaping, dressing, and waxing the ornate beard and moustache patterns which were so much the delight of the Russian’ dandies of the day, But the work I most relished was that of making-up the actors. I suppose I had developed a fondness for things theatrical during my years aS a peanut boy at the Tsarina, and, besides, this make-up work itself appealed to me because it provided some outlet for the imaginative and creative urge which I was just beginning to feel. I somehow regarded making-up an actor in the same serious light most people would the painting of a portrait on canvas, and consequently studied and became unusually adept at this then-primitive art. Preference resulted in my becoming so skilful that I soon excelled even the senior apprentices, and was assigned to all the make-up jobs for illustrious actors in important theatres, In this present era of highly-

refined and perfected make-up, it makes me shudder to think of the compounds which we so nonchalantly applied to the actors’ faces 50 years ago. Greasepaint sticks, mainly manufactured by a famous German cosmetic firm of that day, were available in only two shades -white and a theoretical. "flesh." Kalsomine Powder F a dramatic production required any unusual colour effects, the make-up artist had to compound them himself. And "‘the sky was the limit’’ when it came to. selecting materials. Oe I have seen green kalsomine powder, originally meant to tint a plaster wall, mixed with suet and nonchalantly applied to an unconcerned Russian character-actor as | eyeshadow. ‘Pulverised brick-dust, mixed with grease, was a standard formula with which to supply a player with a swarthy complexion.

WulLve OFlLen the yourniul pdi00om on the cheeks of an ingenue was made of the crimson juice from common beets, mixed with beeswax. More than one actor to whom I applied make-up had _- slightly-perfumed stove polish smeared on his face for a black-face characterisation. Even if such an actor had known that he was stove-pol.shed or kalsomined, he probably would not have objected very strenuously. Actors were an amiable and unpretentious lot in those days; they seemed to expect only the worst in life, and were seldom disappointed. Then, when I was 15 ‘years old, came the great day when I was no longer an apprentice but a Master Wigmaker. I was asked to stay on in the same shop as a salaried associate, but I had other ideas. My skill at applying theatrical makeup had been heard of in other shops of Europe, and the great and famous Anton of Berlin offered me a place on his staff. Anton commanded the largest theatrical make-up trade in the world at that time. He even exported wigs, beards and_ greasepaints as far away as America and Australia. At his establishment I learnt that ingredients other than brick-dust and stove-blacking could be used to make up actors’ faces. Indeed, Anton’s cosmetics, limited as they were in number, were made with the aid of all the scientific knowledge applicable to them at that time. It was here that T gained my first real knowledge of the chemistry which was necessary for the creation of perfumes, powders, facial creams, as well as theatrical greasepaints. Cail To Arms FORTIFIED with all this knowledge-whieh I youthfully considered sufficient to make me the Wigmaking Master Mind of Russia-I resigned at the end of a year and returned to my native land to work in the Moscow shop of Korpo, one of the most famous wigmakers in Russia, I soon discovered at Korpo’s that the time was not quite ripe for me to set myself up as a Master Mind; Wigmaker Korpo knew a few advanced tricks of our trade himself.

And I had never even heard of most of them. His greasepaint contained no more brick-dust than had Anton’s in Berlin. I relaxed from my juvenile cocksureness and returned to learning more of the fascinating intricacies of the business. Then came the call to arms, The fact that I was an ambitious young wigmaker, apparently on the road to success, did not particularly interest the Russian War Office. Army service was compulsory for all able-bodied citizens in those days. Refusal to enlist meant court martial and an almost sure sentence to the prison camps of Siberia. I did not look into this matter of punishment too far. I joined the army in 1895. Having been trained in rudimentary surgery and dentistry, I was assigned to the 142nd Medical Corps as a hospital interne. I served all my army term in the Red Cross hospital in Moscow. Here most of my time was devoted to assisting the dentists, and that is how I acquired the ambition which led me to America, as I shall tell shortly. When my army enlistment ended in 1899, I took my savings and opened a wigmaking shop of my own at Razan, a suburb of Moscow. Having thus established myself as a solid and responsible business man, I was finally able to persuade Elizabeth Rose, a famous creator of costumes for the Moscovski School of Designing, whom I had been courting for three years, to marry me, Prosperous MY shop prospered from the very beginning. On my staff were seven master wigmakers and 15 apprentices. Applying the chemical laboratory techniques which I had learned at Anton’s and Korpo’s, together with some improvements which T had discovered for myself, and developing some skill in the making of perfumes, I built up a useful sideline. But a new ambition was gnawing at me. I wanted to be a dentist!

= q My one determination was to ga to a recognised dental college and finally emerge with the ornate parchment which would assure the world that I was no longer a Wisgmaker who pulled teeth as a suhsidiary endeavour, but a genuine, certified dentist. My ego demanded that I become a great and outstanding dentist, not merely an ordinary one, and when I discovered that the American schools of dentistry were far more advanced than those is my own country, I made up my mind that they were the only ones for me. Even though it meant that we must uproot ourselves from our native land and establish ourselves in a new one, my wife encouraged me in this ambition, not only for my own sake, but for the sake of the three children who had come to us. We carefully saved our money. In four years we considered that we had enough. After selling the shop, we had 64,000 roubles, a sufficiency even when translated into American dollars, to suppert us during the six years of study necessary for me before I could graduate from an American school of dentistry. Putting our old profession and our old country behind us. we embarked on the adventure which was to be a more splendid one than we had ever imagined, even in our wildest dreams. We were on our way to a Hollywood which did not yet exist. CHAPTER fl PLRS. MAX FACTOR and }, to gether with our three: children, Freda, Cecilia, and Davis, arrive in New York as immigrants from Russia. NABLE to speak 2 word of English, we had a most embarrassinely- _ diffieult time trying to make ourselves understood. It was in April, 1904. Beeause I spoke Russian, Polish and German fluently I had imagined that I could learn one more language with very little diffeulty. But I had not taken (Continued on page 26.)

MAX FACTOR’S LIFE STORY

By

MAX FACTOR

(Continued)

into consideration the fact that T had learnt the first three when I was a very small child, merely from association with youngsters who spoke one of them as their native tongue. It was more diflicult, I found, to learn still another after I was grown and a stranger in a strange land. Therefore we decided to set ont as soon as possible for St, Louis where there was a small Russian colony. We knew chat constant association with those who spoke both Russian and English would be the best way in which we could acquaint ourselves with the new language. Arrived in St. Louis I discovered that the classes of the Dental College at which I had enrolied were due to open in five montis. The idea of waiting all that time in idleness appailed me. I had always been a very busy person aud did not know what to do with my leisure. I began to look round. Not only did I want something to occupy me, but ] knew that almost any activity I might undertake would further my proficiency in speaking the language of which { was so ignorant. This looking round resulted in a venture which changed the whole course of my ife. In 1904 St. Louis was the scene of a magnificent exhibition which attracted visitors from all over the world. Why, I asked myself, should I not reap a benefit from the thronging crowds by taking a concession to sell cosmetics, perfumes and powders? It would augment my capital, aid my mastery of English and keep my mind occupied. Well-meaning friends, afraid that I might be taking too big a risk, prevailed upon me to loeok for a partner who, besides sharing the financial burden, would be able to speak English. Unfortunately, I heeded their advice, The partner I found certainly could speak English, but ET am afraic he took more money out of the business than he ever put into it. The little shop at the Wxhibition attracted a clientele which has remained faithful to this day, and always had an air of prosperity about it. But an inspection of the books shattered this illusion, revealing that my partner and the rent were two overheads which I simply could not afford. I tried to rid myself of the former, but a contract drawn up in a language which I could searcely understand had insured his costly permanence. Although I had already drawn heavily upon my capital to keep open, I foolishly decided to try to build up such a huge volume of business that I should be able to recoup my. losses. In this case my natural stubbornness and aversion to admit defeat cost me very dearly. I struggled on and sent good money after bad. By the time the Exhibition ended, my capital, 32,000 dollars (£6400) had nearly all gone. The only comfort I could find at the moment was that my partner had gote, too. I closed the doors of my little shop and went home to worry. The study of dentistry-the original object of my emigration to America-was out of the. question. I thought seriously of packing up and going back to Russia. But I had not enough money to pay the fare. Opening Shop f80M pure neeessity, then, 1 remained in St. Louis, Salvaging what little stock and equipment I could, and borrowing money from my friends to the very limit of their williueness and ability, I opened a small hair-goods shop, concentrating mainly upon the creation of the Switches and curls which women favoured at that time.

I was not particularly busy, but. from the very first the business operated at a profit, and before a year had passed I was able to expand my activities to include a barber’s shop and a Turkish bath. With the cessation of financial worries I started to regain confidence in myself. temembering that most of the women who had visited the Eixh‘pition grounds had displayed a remarkable willingness to ignore the Fair’s outstanding mechanical, scientific, and artistic marvels in order to come to my shop and inspect the beauty aids 1 had on display there, I regarded this as a business barometer which could not be ignored. So I installed a tiny laboratory in the rear of my shop and devoted my spare hours to perfectjing the scents, creams, and powders which I had first made in Russia. Once again on the shelves of my shop, alongside the cosmetics of famous German and French houses, there appeared containers labelled with the name of Max Factor. With the return of prosperity I pegan to become dissatisfied with St. Louis, and started io look round for a city where opportunities for business growth would be comvaratively unlimited. I made inquiries and discovered that Los Angeles was probabiy the place Yoy which I had been looking-a young, growing city, Starting out as a little Spanish pueblo in the year 1783, it had remained comparatively dormant for akout ninety years. Then, in the 1870’s, it had really started to expand. This growth had been a Slow and steady one until after the dawn of the twentiet. century, when the little city had started on a rampage of enlargement never equailed in the history of the world. ‘In 1907, the year in which I was considering a move there, Los Angeles had a population of 200,000 ---double the number of inhabitants it had only a few years before; today, this population totals nearly a million and a half. What definitely decided me to move there, however, was the fact that the infant motion-picture industry, attracted by the sunshine which was the only suitable light for picture-making in those days, had started its exodus from -the Bast Coast and was now on its way to California. Mary Pickford PERHAPS I may be allowed to boast that I was one of the pioneer appreciators of the motion-pieture industry’s great possibilities. In Russia my observation of the widespread popularity of the little legitimate theatres had convinced me that. every one was hungry for dramatic entertainment. And now, here in America, this drama was eoming to life on reels of celluloid and being piaced within reach of a population which heretofore had been deprived of the humblesi of stage productions. ’ $uch an industry, I feit, could not help but take on gigantic proportions. And, sooner or later, there would be a demand for wigs, coiffures and make-ups especially created to meet cinematic needs. Full of hope, ! arrived in Los Angeles on the morning of October 11, 1908. There was, to all practical purposes, no such place as Hollywood. In those days it was still large. ly an area of farms and scattered real estates. What motion-picture industry there was at the _time wis located in Los Angeles pro: per. For instance, when D. W. Grifith brought his picture stock company, including Mary Pickford. Henry B. Walthall, Jack Pickford, and Owen Moore to the Wesi Coast, he estublished ‘his activi

ties on a vacant lot which was: only four blocks away from. the down-town business centre of Los _ Angeles, The first big picture ever pro- | duced in one whole reel in Cali-fornia-‘The Count of Monte Cristo"-was made on the roof of an office building in the heart of the city. Shortly after my arrival I had the good fortune to hear that a skilled wigmaker was needed at a large hair-goods shop, one Madame Petra’s. I applied for the job and secured it, Assuming that wigmaking would be as well paid in this new city as it was in Berlin and Moscow, I _ went to work without asking what iny salary would be. Imagine my surprise and indignation when, on drawing my first week’s salary, 1 found that it was but the equivalent of £3! It was hardly enough to covar my own necessities, and the idea of bringing my wife and kiddies from St. Louis to live on such a . pittance was, I knew, preposter- »

ous. Disgusted, I walked out and went to look for a business location for myself. The result was that I made my debut as the owner of a small barber’s shop eight blocks from the heart of the city. Once having settled down, [I wasted no time in sending for my wife and children. Mrs. Factor was unable to arrange a satisfactory sale of our. business in St. Louis and had to leave it under a salaried manager. It did not prosper in his charge, and when the premises were razed by fire six months later we made no effort ta have them rebuilt. It was not long before I augmented my barber’s shop with a wig and general hair-goods shop in an adjoining store space. This expansion proved remarkably lucky. "Rats" In Vogue A Ficw weeks after I had opened, hair puffs for feminine coiffures, generally referred

to as ‘‘rats,’’ came into vogue, and as I had acquired a great deal of experience in crafting these when they were the rage in Russia some eight years before, E was able to produce them much more quickly and expertly than the average hair-goods craftsman in Los Angeles, Within a year I gladly disposed of my barber’s shop-my soul was never in barbering, anyway-and devoted the major portion of my time to the hair-goods trade. With the coming of the film people to California I began te take an interest in motion pictures. Observing that the faces of the players on the screen ger erally seemed ghastly pale and lacking in expression, I decided that there must be something wrong with their make-up, (Continued Next Week.)