Rensselaer Union, Volume 7, Number 16, Rensselaer, Jasper County, 7 January 1875 — About Hair. [ARTICLE]

About Hair.

A correspondent of the Philadelphia Press writes: “I have recently learned some interesting facts respecting a manufacture in which every female head throughout the land is interested, namely, the preparation of human hair and its transformation into switches, ringlets, etc. The largest establishment of this nature in the world exists in Germany. It is situated in a town called Wetzlar, in the valley of the Lahn. .It is the depot to which the traveling collectors of hair bring their wares to dispose of. and so extensive are its transactions that their wares are arranged in bales, each containing three and four hundred pounds of hair. These bales each contain a heterogeneous mass of human locks of every "shade and texture, from raven black to flaxen?* blonde, from horsehair coarseness to silken fineness. This s the material in the rough, and very dirty and disgusting are often the peas-ant-grown tresses when brought into the factory. But fear nothing/ladies fair, respecting the cleanliness of your alien jocks; all the hair is thoroughly boiled before being placed in the hands of the work-girls, of whom 600 are employed in thia establishment. The hair, -1 • ■ ■

when dried and smoothed, is then carefully sorted according to color and length. Good brown hair of average length is worth about $75 a pound; the highest-priced hair is pure white, long tresses of which are sold, not by the Eound but by the single hair, each hair eing valued at about half a cent. The most valuable of the natural hues is pale gold; a switch of that color was displayed valued at nearly SIOO, even in that wholesale mart. The greatest curiosity there was a switch of light brown hair measuring six feet in length, and for which SIOO had been paid to the original owner thereof; this unparalleled braid is not to be sold, but is to be reserved for exhibition at our Centennial.”