Robyn

Madam C. J. Walker (click the title to go to Robyn's website)   Independent Study Project Experience: 3rd Project Description: My Independent Study Project is on Madam C.J. Walker. It tells about her life and what she did. Primary Product: Website Define your project: A website is a page online. It usually tells you information about something or someone. Objectives I did: 1. found books and websites for report 2. wrote report for Madam C.J. Walker 3. got pictures to put on my website 4. did website 5. typed report Other objectives I will do: 1. soon I wish to make a hair product of my own for the ISP fair 2. finish back drop

My Independent Study Project is on Madam C. J. Walker. Madam C. J. Walker is the first female millionaire. She found a product that helps black hair in growth and made a lot of money. I chose to study her because she accomplished a lot and I wanted to learn about what she did. Madam C. J. Walker also built her a theatre that made money for her. I liked what Madam C. J. Walker did so I wanted to learn more about her. I hoped to learn how Madam C. J. Walker became a millionaire. I also wanted to learn what businesses that she had. Another thing I wanted to learn was what Madam C. J. Walker's job was. I learned everything that I expected to learn. Some stuff came out to be different than I expected. To do my research I looked on the Internet for information on Madam C. J. Walker. I also looked for books in the library. Then I looked through all of the information that I found. Reading the books that I found was very helpful because they told me a lot of things about Madam C. J. Walker. Sometimes it was hard to find specific facts on Madam C. J. Walker because the Internet might take me places I didn't want to go. Finding information on Madam C. J. Walker was mostly easy, though. I learned a lot about Madam C. J. Walker's childhood. Her birth name was Sarah Breedlove. Sarah was born December 23, 1867. She was born free from slavery on the Burney family farm in Delta, Louisiana. The plantation was right on the shores of the Mississippi River. Sarah was orphaned at the age of seven and afterwards lived with her sister. When she was old enough, she moved out. Sarah Breedlove had a family of five. Her brother's name was Alex, and her sister's name was Louvenia. Both her brother and her sister were older than she was. Her mother was Minerva Breedlove and her father was Owen Breedlove. They had a nice family, but they were also very poor. That is why Sarah and her siblings were orphaned at a young age. Her mother died before her father. Her father got remarried and later he died. Madam C. J. Walker had three husbands. Her first husband was Moses McWilliams. She married him when she was fourteen years old, to get away from her sister's husband. Her husband died when their daughter was three years old. Sarah was a widow at twenty years old. Her second husband was John Davis. They got married August 11, 1894. That marriage failed and ended sometime in 1903. Sarah's third husband was to Charles Joseph Walker. Then her name was Mrs. C. J. Walker, but she called herself Madam to convey an image of status and importance. Charles Walker was a newspaper sales agent. After seven years of marriage they divorced sometime in 1910. Madam C. J. Walker has lived in a lot of places during her lifetime. The first place she lived was in Delta, Louisiana where she was born. After she was orphaned she moved across the Mississippi River to Vicksburg, Mississippi. She lived with her sister then moved with her first husband. After her husband died she moved to St. Louis, Missouri. She had heard that laundresses could earn good money. In Sarah's eyes St. Louis was a flashy town. It was full of noise and ragtime music, saloons and dance halls, gamblers and musicians, hustlers and hardworking folks. It had one of the countries largest colored communities. After Sarah found out that her brother Alex had died she moved to Denver, Colorado so she could be closer to his wife and children. There, she made her hair products, sold them, and started her business. The next place she moved was to Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania. In Pittsburgh, there was a lot of steel to make Madam Walker's pressing combs. There was also a lot of pressing combs. There was also a lot of transportation to ship her products. Madam Walker moved to Indianapolis, Indiana next and there she built a building that covered an entire block. In addition to office and factory space the building also had a theatre, especially for the city's colored people. In 1918, Madam Walker moved to Irvington-on-Hudson, New York, on the Hudson River. She built herself a fabulous mansion called Villa Lewaro there. Madam Walker as lived in many different places. In the life of Sarah Breedlove her hair kept falling out. Sarah didn't know how to make her hair start growing again. Sense Sarah couldn't find a way to make her hair to start back growing again she prayed to God. When she woke up the next morning her hair was still falling out and some was on her pillow, but that night Sarah had a dream. In her dream she saw a big black man that told her to fix her hair. Sarah mixed together the ingredients she saw in her dream. The ingredients were beeswax, copper sulfate, sulfur, violet extract, coconut oil, and carbolic acid. Sarah mixed the ingredients taking strict notes on everything she did. Her handwriting wasn't the best and she spelled the best she could. Finally, when Sarah thought the mixture was right she tried it. Surely, it worked. Sarah's hair started growing faster than it had ever fallen out. Although the ingredients were strong, they didn't burn at all. They healed her scalp and made hair healthy. After Sarah found out that her mixture worked well in hair she decided to go into business herself. First Sarah decided to do door-to-door sales. She had three products that she sold. Her products were Vegetable Shampoo, Wonderful Hair Grower, and Glossine. She gave demonstrations in the kitchens of black women. In her demonstrations she would first wash women's hair with her Vegetable Oil. Next she would apply the Wonderful Hair Grower to nourish the scalp. Finally she would use an especially designed metal comb heated on a gas stove to press in the Glossine, a light oil that softened the women's tight curls. Sarah never said the words "bad hair," which meant kinky and nappy or "good hair," which meant straight and glossy. White women had "good hair," and they were models of beauty to black women who had "bad hair." Sarah thought this was insulting. Sarah worked hard going door-to-door in the kitchen of black demonstrating her products. She made a lot of money with her methods of selling. Madam C. J. Walker had a great business. She door-to-door sold and had her own advertisements. A lot of her advertisements used white women with long, shiny, glossy looking hair, but Sarah used herself as a model. Her ads showed healthiness in her scalp and the length of her own hair. Sarah also sowed a before and after picture of herself in her advertisements. Madam C. J. Walker had hired agents, or other salesworkers going door-to-door demonstrating Madam Walker's products, to help sell them. They also went door-to-door selling the products and giving demonstrations. They also told about the Madam Walker hair business because most of the customers also became agents of Madam C. J. Walker. By 1908, after only two years of starting her company, Madam Walker had signed almost one hundred representatives. She sold directly to customers in their homes and through mail. The Mme. C. J. Walker Manufacturing company was making $400 a week. In the same year Madam Walker and Lelia, her daughter, opened up the Lelia College of Hair Culturists. Housekeepers, laundresses, and nursemaids all went to the college to learn something new. Madam Walker left Lelia in charge of the business in Pittsburgh and she moved to Indianapolis. By then the company was making more than $3, 000 a week, and in Indianapolis Madam Walker built the Walker Building. In April of 1919, Madam Walker had gotten very sick on a business trip to St. Louis. She immediately went home, to Villa Lewaro. Back at Villa Lewaro, Madam Walker ordered one of her accountants to donate $5, 000 to the anti-lynching fund of the NAACP. At that time it was the largest donation they had ever received. Madam Walker was going down fast. At last she was barely able to whisper the words, "I want to live to help my race." Then Madam C. J. Walker closed her eyes and died. She was only fifty-one years old. She died May 25, 1919. She had a successful business. She became the first female millionaire. In the life of Madam C. J. Walker, she accomplished a lot and did it successfully as a female, black, entrepreneur. Madam C. J. Walker did a lot for her race. Today there are two places that are still standing in memory of Madam C. J. Walker. One of the places is her mansion that she lived in before her death. Her mansion is Villa Lewaro. It is located on North Broadway in Irvington-on-Hudson, New York. Villa Lewaro was passed to her daughter, A'Lelia, who gave the house to the NAACP. They weren't able to accept the gift because of the upkeep, so Villa Lewaro was passed through. The property is now going under restoration and was in the May/June 1998 issue of the National Trust for Historic Preservation's Preservation magazine. Now this mansion stands as a reminder to everybody of Madam Walker's wonderful accomplishments, although, Villa Lewaro is not open to the public. The other building that is an important place standing in memory of Madam C. J. Walker is the Walker Theatre. The Walker Theatre was opened for black people who weren't allowed in the same theatre as blacks or were forced on the balconies. It was opened in 1927. The theatre was previously part of the Walker Building, which was the home of the Mme. Walker Manufacturing Company. A $2.3 million renovation of the theatre was finished in 1987. The theatre was named in honor of its namesake and it is listed as a National Historic Landmark. The Walker Building has always been located at 617 Indiana Avenue in Indianapolis, Indiana. It is still there called the Walker Theatre. Doing the research for this project has been interesting. Finding the information was very easy and simple. Although, this is my 2nd time writing an Independent Study Project report it still helped me. It helped me improve my skills in writing a report. There are many things that I might do if I had more time on my report. One thing that I would probably do is write more paragraphs. There is a lot of work in this report that I accomplished.   Glossary Agents - the women that also went door-to-door selling and demonstrating Madam C.J. Walker's products Entrepreneur - someone that starts their own business Laundress - someone who washes clothes for a living NAACP - National Association for the Advancement of Colored People Saloon - a place where alcoholic drinks are sold and drunk; a tavern Theatre - another form of theater   Bibliography E. Ferguson-Roberts, Sharon. G. Giles, Rita. H. Miles, Johnie. J. Davis, Jaunita. (2001). Educator's Sourcebook of African American Heritage. Paramus, N. J. Lasky, Katherine. (2000). Vision of Beauty: The Story of Sarah Breedlove Walker. Cambridge, MA Krause, Lisa. On her Underground: Madam C.J. Walker. [Online] Available http://www.nationalgeographic.com/news/2001/03/0301_MadamWalker.html. March 24, 2004. Madam C.J. Walkler. [Online] Available http://www.princeton.edu/~mcbrown/display/walker.html, March 24, 2004.. Madam C.J. Walker. [Online] Available http://www.madamecjwalker.com, November 6, 2003.

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