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  • 2021-02-03 (xsd:date)
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  • Did Prostitute Gerda Puridle Invent Fake Eyelashes To, Umm... Protect Her Eyes? (en)
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  • In January 2021, the website America's Best Pics shared a meme claiming that a prostitute named Gerda Puridle invented long eyelashes in 1880s: The woman in this picture was not a prostitute, her name was not Gerda Puridle, and the claim about the origins of artificial eyelashes was made up out of whole cloth. The woman featured in this meme is Alice Regnault, a French actress and novelist who rose to prominence in the 1870s. This photograph appears to have been taken by French photographer Gaspard-Félix Tournachon (better known as Nadar) circa 1879. It was included in a guide published a few years later called Les Actrices de Paris (The Actresses of Paris) by Emile Bergerat: Here's how Regnault was described in Les Actrices de Paris (translated via Google and edited for clarity): An intelligent and flexible actress who, through commitment and hard work, has managed to escape a reputation as a 'pretty woman' — where the love of the masses kept her, as in a prison. So has the fine and elegant Mademoiselle Régnault proven herself, for some time now. While Regnault laid claim to titles such as actress, novelist, and journalist, she did not invent elongated eyelashes. According to beauty magazine Marie Claire, humans were tinkering with and beautifying their eyelashes in ancient Egypt, though it wasn't until the late 1800s that people figured out that they could lengthen their eyelashes with human hair. An 1882 volume of Medical Record explained the process of creating artificial eyelashes: While the practice of artificially elongating eyelashes started in the late 1800s, the first patent for an artificial eyelash wasn't secured until 1911. Here's a look at inventor Anna Taylor's artificial eyelash patent: Despite the fact that artificial eyelashes have been around since the late 1800s, and that Taylor filed a patent in 1911, many people credit filmmaker D.W. Griffith for popularizing artificial eyelashes with his 1916 film Intolerance. The New York Times reported: In short, the claim that a prostitute named Gerda Puridle invented elongated eyelashes is completely made up out of whole cloth. (en)
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