The one-stop blog spot for your Nineteenth Century Mustache needs!
Dear Gentle Reader,
Many of the following pages have graphic and clear images of the masculine mustache in all its forms, both sublime and grotesque. My intent is not to shock or titillate, but merely to inform on the subject. The Nineteenth Century gave us many things, but above all it was a hotbed of facial hair experimentation and this is but a poor sampling of those many lost forms.
While the details of their mustaches are obscured, these gentlemen are to be lauded for venturing outside for an amateur snapshot of their mustaches. To leave the safety of a professional mustache photography studio is very brave.
This poor sufferer's mustache is completely bald in the middle. There are many causes of Mustache Baldness, but the most perplexing is the little understood North American Hook-beaked Mustache Swallow, an insidious creature that steals the softest mustache hairs to line its nests. Thought extinct after their flesh became a delicacy in the salons of Europe in the 1880s, there have been recent reports of a live specimen caught in the Oregon territories.
The right-handed side of this gentleman's mustache droops quite severely compared to the left. It is possible his mustache has suffered a debilitating stroke.
While many men stoically sit for a mustache portrait, this young man seems almost angry. It could be an indication of a mustache-wasting disease, specifically the type triggered by strict Fletcherism.
A robust and thick handlebar with a overhand twist. His right side may have drooped under a fierce flash of powder or it could be a rare underhand twist.
Given the careful attention paid to the part and swoop of the hair it makes it likely that the bushy neglect of the mustache is purposeful. Some mustaches long to run free, and some men are brave enough to let them.
Not only has the handlebar mustache almost died out (there is but one prominent example on television outside of period dramas, and even his is often unkempt and untwisted), but the most impressive variation, the facespanner is nowhere to be found. This proud example is a straight and true as the man who wears it.
It is not often so many fine mustaches gather in one spot, especially for the camera. The two unfortunates on the left may be apprenticing to some day grow their own examples, or they may have lost the use of their mustaches in the war or a farm accident.