Karl Nessler

Karl Ludwig Nessler ( born 2 May 1872 in Todtnau, Baden, † January 22, 1951 in Harrington Park, New Jersey ) was a German hairdresser and the inventor of the permanent wave.

Life and work

Karl Nessler was the son of Bartholomew Nessler shoemaker and his wife Rosina (born Laitner ) from the Black Forest town of Todtnau below the Feldberg.

The idea for the perm came to his supposedly already in his youth. It is reported that he occasionally worked as a shepherd as a child and he noticed with this is that sheep hair was in contrast to the human hair curled permanently. First, he began an apprenticeship at the nearby Fahrnau the village barber Busam, but he breaks off after a few months. He expanded his experience by staying in Basel, Milan and Geneva, where he learned Italian and French.

In Geneva, he finds a job at a prestigious hairdressing and continues his education. Adhere to the French-speaking environment adapting he calls himself now and for the rest of his life, Charles Nessler, sometimes Charles Nestle.

A few years later he moved to Paris. There he meets Katharina Laible know that comes from the Ulm area and finds himself willing to let you try the first perm Nessler itself.

These shares Nessler three strands of her hair off, binds each of them close to the scalp from wetted them with a mysterious mixture and wrapped the hair helically on metal rods. With a self-designed, electrically heated forceps, similar to the waffle iron, he heated the horn-shaped protruding structures. Nessler must constantly keep the tongs and brings his victim blisters at. The curl does not succeed at first, until the 3rd attempt, with Nessler curlers washes out long. The corrugation remained and was called " permanent wave".

He moved to London and married there Katharina Laible. In 1902 he granted his first patent on the production of artificial eyebrows and eyelashes. His permanent wave apparatus he used in his own salon in the exclusive Oxford Street at still.

In the London ladies the customer of Nessler's invention spread rapidly and his salon is large audiences. 1906 holds Nessler be perming process for as far advanced that he can show it off to the exclusive colleagues shaft of London. He invites the "Leading Hairdressers' for 8 October of the year for a demonstration. The demonstration is but a failure. The reason for this is perhaps less of a reluctance of experts to identify the method as a new, rather than their fear of losing the permanent customers.

Nessler refused to be dissuaded from his idea and enhances the advertising for his invention, the hair curler. In February 1910 he filed for bankruptcy on February 6, 1909 the British Patent 20,597 is for his electrical apparatus, granted the permanent wave machine.

Gradually spread the fame of his perm. In 1913 he makes significant improvements to his machine patented. He works continually to improve its techniques that lead to a new, requested 1914 and 1915 granted patent. At the outbreak of the First World War he was interned as an enemy alien by the British authorities, confiscated his property.

After his release Nessler then migrates to New York. In America, however, are by this time hundreds of black copies of his telephone in circulation. But Nessler makes it immediately to a fresh start and report back in April 1918 as a U.S. citizen his improved apparatus also on the U.S. patent for, patent holder is a company founded by him Nestle Patent Holding Co. Inc. The concept works, he is soon the houses front Nos. 8 to 14 in the East 49th Street with its shops. He developed a home device that costs only $ 15. In 1927, he worked in New York, Chicago, Detroit, Palm Beach and Philadelphia already 500 employees, his business empire is worth millions, annual spending on advertising amounted to approximately U.S. $ 300,000. 1935 dies his wife Catherine. He continues to work on the improvement of the process, from 1919 to 1939 it reports 4 more patents in the United States.

Nessler has not forgotten its origin from humble. During the economic crisis of the 1920s, he donates needy inhabitants of the Todtnau for that time considerable sum of 20,000 marks. In 1929, he loses by the Black Thursday almost his entire fortune.

On January 22, 1951 Karl Nessler dies in Harrington Park (New Jersey, USA).

Honors

Since 1996 will be awarded in the birthplace of Karl Ludwig Nessler of NESSLER PRICE. The occasion was the invention of perm 90 years ago. The prize was donated by the Nessler Committee and is 2500 euros the most valuable craft price Germany. It is awarded every three years to a particularly deserving and committed person in hairdressing. Previous winners: 1996 Alfred Preußner ( Gevelsberg ), 1999 Erwin Schmidt ( Bretten ), 2002 Manfred schmuck ( Darmstadt ), 2006 Siegfried Helias (Berlin) and 2011 Franz Josef Kueveler ( Mending / Pfalz ).

Since October 2006 ( the 100th anniversary of the invention of the perm ) are available in Todtnau a Nessler Museum, which is set up as a hair salon in the Art Nouveau style.

Writings

• Charles Nessler: textbook perm on hair of humans. Berlin: R. Bredow, 1922.
• Charles Nessler: The story of hair; its purposes and its preservation; New York: Boni & Liveright, 1928.
• Charles Nessler: Our vanishing hair; a dissertation on human hair production with special reference to premature baldness; New York, NY: The Alwyn -Schmidt publishing co, around 1934.