by Roxy Triebel
treebz65@hotmail.com
Our Corkscrew Curls
Elta Van Kleeck (with corkscrew curls) and her mother Bertha (Barringer) Van Kleeck
My sister, Elta, and I both were blessed with fine, straight hair, and I remember when we were young (Elta probably around 11 or 12 years old, and myself around 8 or 9 years old), we had quite long hair, below our shoulders. We liked to wear it in curls. I guess Mother liked to see it that way, because even though many evenings she must have been so tired from all her work, she took the time and effort to do our hair. It was quite a process - usually had a bag of rags that had been made ready and used many times over. They were most likely from old sheets, etc. - about one inch wide and probably about eighteen inches long - according to the length of our hair and it was dampened slightly. Then, a small section was measured off - the rag was fastened by tying it to a lock as near the scalp as possible at one end - then the hair was wound around the rag tightly and at the end of the lock of hair, the rag was folded over the end and would over the hair until the knot at the top was reached. Then it was tied firmly to the end of the rag. This was done until all the hair had been wound. It was a knotty, uncomfortable head to sleep on, but the thought of the curls we'd have the next day helped a lot.When morning came and the rags were untied (sometimes through the night several would come undone with all our tossing - no corkscrew there - just a slight fluff) and the rag carefully pulled from the hair, and the curls brushed lightly over Mother's finger. It the weather was good - no rain or humidity - we might have curls for 2 days. Otherwise, they usually had to be done about every night.
If our hair was shorter, there was another method used. A shorter rag about eight or ten inches long was used. The end of the hair was very carefully tucked into the middle of the rag and wound over the rag until the scalp was reached, then a tight knot was tied - another bumpy uncomfortable night. This was combed out loose and made real fluffy or else tight curls close to the head. If a person had coarser hair with more body than we were blessed with, the curls would stay quite well for four or five days.
This was long before the process known as "permanents" was even thought of. Some folks said they used a slight sugar water to help keep the curls longer - seems that would be a sticky process. When we grew older, we used the trusty curling iron, heating it over the kerosene lamps. I can smell the awful odor when the iron got too hot. Then we would have a crimpy burnt spot of hair. First we had the straight iron, and then came the one with several crimps to make waves. These curls usually lasted about the same as those done with rags. It depended on the weather. The advantage was that the iron could be used just before going out, and we didn't have to sleep on the bumps all night.
In the summer, we might be allowed to wash our hair once a week. In the winter - horrors - we would be flirting with pneumonia if we washed it during a real cold spell. Once a month was often enough. Mother would use one of those small fine-tooth combs and go over our hair - this helped to remove dandruff, etc. and she was always on the watch for those small creatures - LICE. She never found any on our heads, but years before she had found them on our older sister Vera's head, and never gave up the search after that.
Then came the electric curling iron. We were well in our teens then.
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