Natural High is starting a new series of Hair History stories and facts.
Our first Hair History story comes from Civil Rights Leader Malcolm X. While he needs no introduction here is a small background on his history.
Malcolm X was a human rights activist, public speaker and minister in the 1950’s and early 60’s. He was and still is considered an advocate for African Americans of his time and even today.
While Malcolm X left his mark in history. This post is all about his hair. Yes, his hair. In his Autobiography simply entitled” The Autobiography of Malcolm X,” he shares his recipe for his “first conk.”
A conk also known as a ” congolene” was a popular hairstyle among African Americans in the 1930’s to mid 1960’s. This is also known as lye or a relaxer to modern times.
Here is an excerpt from his Autobiography:
Shorty soon decided that my hair was finally long enough to be conked1. He had promised to school me in how to beat the barbershops’ three- and four-dollar price by making up congolene, and then conking ourselves.
I took the little list of ingredients he had printed out for me, and went to
a grocery store, where I got a can of Red Devil lye, two eggs, and two medium-
sized white potatoes. Then at a drugstore near the poolroom, I asked for a large
jar of vaseline, a large bar of soap, a large-toothed comb, and a fine-toothed
comb, one of those rubber hoses with a metal spray-head, a rubber apron, and a
pair of gloves.
Shorty paid six dollars a week for a room in his cousin’s shabby apartment. His cousin wasn’t at home. “It’s like the pad’s mine, he spends so much time with his woman,” Shorty said. “Now, you watch me —”
He peeled the potatoes and thin-sliced them into a quart-sized Mason fruit jar, then started stirring them with a wooden spoon as he gradually poured in a little over half the can of lye. “Never use a metal spoon; the lye will turn it black,” he told me.
A jelly-like, starchy-looking glop resulted from the lye and potatoes, and
Shorty broke in the two eggs, stirring real fast — his own conk and dark face bent
down close. The congolene turned pale-yellowish. “Feel the jar,” Shorty said. I
cupped my hand against the outside, and snatched it away. “Damn right, it’s hot,
that’s the lye,” he said. “So you know it’s going to burn when I comb it in — it
burns bad. But the longer you can stand it, the straighter the hair.”
He made me sit down, and he tied the string of the new rubber apron tightly
around my neck, and combed up my bush of hair. Then, from the big vaseline jar, he
took a handful and massaged it hard all through my hair and into the scalp. He
also thickly vaselined my neck, ears and forehead. “When I get to washing out your
head, be sure to tell me any-where you feel any little stinging,” Shorty warned
me, washing his hands, then pulling on the rubber gloves, and tying on his own
rubber apron. “You always got to remember that any congolene left in burns a sore
into your head.”
My eyes watered, my nose was running. I couldn’t stand it any longer; I
bolted to the washbasin. I was cursing Shorty with every name I could think of
when he got the spray going and started soap lathering my head.
He lathered and spray-rinsed, lathered and spray-rinsed, maybe ten or twelve times, each time gradually closing the hot-water faucet, until the rinse was cold, and that helped some.
“No,” I managed to say. My knees were trembling.
“Sit back down, then. I think we got it all out okay.”
The flame came back as Shorty, with a thick towel, started drying my head,
When Shorty let me stand up and see in the mirror, my hair hung down in limp, damp strings. My scalp still flamed, but not as badly; I could bear it. He draped the towel around my shoulders, over my rubber apron, and began again vaselining my hair.
My first view in the mirror blotted out the hurting. I’d seen some pretty
conks, but when it’s the first time, on your own head, the transformation, after
the lifetime of kinks, is staggering.
The mirror reflected Shorty behind me. We both were grinning and sweating.
This was my first really big step toward self-degradation
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He explains how silly he was to want to change is hair to feel superior. Malcolm X further dicusses the self hatred that went on daily during his time and how impressive conks make African Americans feel .
Also here is a clip of a reenactment of his first conk in Spike Lee’s Biography film Malcolm X, starring Denzel Washington and Spike Lee as Shorty.
** starts at 4:09.
What are your thoughts on how times have changed? How self love has evolved into a celebration for us all to enjoy?