Democratic Sentinel, Volume 7, Number 42, Rensselaer, Jasper County, 16 November 1883 — Should the Hair Be Cut. [ARTICLE]

Should the Hair Be Cut.

It may be that cutting and shaving may for the time increase the action of the growth, but it has no permanent effect either upon the hair bulb or the hair sac, and will not in any way add to the life of the hair.. On the contrary, cutting and shaving will cause the hair to grow longer for the time being, but in the end will inevitably shorten its term of life by exhausting the nutritive action of the hair-forming apparatus. When the hairs are frequently cut they will usually become coarser, often losing the beautiful gloss of the fine and delicate hairs. The pigment will likewise change—brown, for instance, becoming chestnut, and black changing to a dark brown. In addition, the ends of very many will be split and ragged, presenting a brushlike appearance. If the hairs appear stunted in their growth upon portions of the scalp or beard, or gray hairs crop up here and there, the method of clipping off the ends of the short hairs, or plucking out the ragged, withered, and gray hairs, will allow them to grow stronger and thicker. Mothers in rearing their children should not cut their hair at certain periods of the year (during the superstitious periods of full moon), in order to increase its length and luxuriance as they bloom into womanhood and manhood. This babit of cutting the hair of children brings evil instead of good, and is also condemned by the distinguished worker in this department, Prof. Kaposi, of Vienna, who states that it is well known that the hair of women who possess luxuriant locks from the time of girlhood never again attains its original length after having once been cut. Pincus has made the same observation by frequent experiments, and he adds that there is a general impression that frequent cutting of the hair increases its length; but the effect is different from that generally supposed. Thus, upon one occasion he states that he cut off circles of hair an inch in diameter on the heads of healthy men, and from week to week compared the intensity of growth of the shorn place with the rest of the hair. The result was surprising to this close and careful observer, as he found in some cases the numbers were equal, but generally the growth became slower after cutting, and he has never observed an increase in rapidity. I might also add that I believe many beardless faces and bald heads in middle and advanced age are often due to constant cutting and shaving in early life. The young girls and boys seen daily upon our streets with their closely-cropped heads, and young men with their clean-shaven faces, are year by year by this fashion having their hair-forming apparatus overstrained.— Dr. Shoemaker.