PBA Galleries

32 pp. Original printed wrappers, green cloth spine.

Half this book consists of music and lyrics for such familiar spirituals as Study War No More, Old Time Religion and Swing Low, Sweet Chariot – with a Foreword about the importance of preserving music which symbolized the “survival under adverse circumstances in Caucasian civilization” of “our unenlightened and illiterate ancestors”. More importantly, the other half displays illustrated ads for the Overton Company’s African-American cosmetics – “High-Brown” Face Powder (“the first market success in the sale of cosmetics for Black women"), Hair Grower, Shampoo Soap, Cold Cream, Talcum Powder and Tooth Paste. Born into slavery in Louisiana at the end of the Civil War, Anthony Overton established his Hygienic Company, which he later called “the largest Negro manufacturing enterprise in the United States”, in 1898 – ten years before Madam C.J.Walker began to build the cosmetics empire which would make her the best-known Black businesswoman in America. As Overton diversified his Chicago financial holdings into banking, insurance, real estate and newspapers, his pioneering cosmetics firm lost its original dominant market share to Walker and her white competitors. Early Overton advertising publications such as this have become scarce.