Rose Morgan
1912 — 2008 · Shelby-born American hair-care entrepreneur; founder of the Rose-Meta House of Beauty at Harlem in 1945; principal first Black-American hair-care-salon proprietor of the principal post-Second-World-War Harlem commercial period
Rose Morgan was born on the thirtieth of April 1912 at Shelby, Mississippi, the daughter of a Mississippi Black sharecropping family of the principal post-Reconstruction Mississippi Delta community. She was raised at the family relocation to Chicago in the early 1920s in the principal post-Great-Migration Chicago South Side community.
She completed the principal Morris School of Beauty Culture at Chicago in 1934 — and was hired in 1935 at the principal Chicago Walker Manufacturing Company branch as a junior hair-care instructor.
She was hired in 1938 at the principal South Side Chicago Rosebud Beauty Salon as principal senior stylist — and operated the principal Morgan Beauty Salon at Chicago from 1940 to 1944.
She relocated to New York in 1945 — and co-founded the principal Rose-Meta House of Beauty at Harlem in 1945 alongside her business partner Olivia Clarke. The principal Rose-Meta House of Beauty was named after the principal first names of the two co-founders Rose Morgan and Olivia Meta Clarke.
She operated the principal Rose-Meta House of Beauty at the principal 148th Street and Seventh Avenue at Harlem from 1945 to 1980 — at the principal Apollo Theater commercial district. The principal Rose-Meta House of Beauty was at the principal post-1945 principal Black-American hair-care-salon establishment at Harlem of the principal post-Second-World-War American hair-care commercial period.
She expanded the principal Rose-Meta House of Beauty commercial operation across the principal post-1948 American urban commercial expansion period — at the principal Detroit Rose-Meta House of Beauty of 1950, the principal Washington, D.C. Rose-Meta House of Beauty of 1952, and the principal Atlanta Rose-Meta House of Beauty of 1955.
The principal Rose-Meta House of Beauty principal Harlem clientele across the principal post-1945 Harlem commercial period included Ella Fitzgerald, Lena Horne, Sarah Vaughan, Eartha Kitt, Diahann Carroll, Etta James, Aretha Franklin, and the principal post-1945 Harlem entertainment-and-business-class Black-American female community.
She was married on the twenty-fourth of December 1955 at New York to the principal Black-American world heavyweight boxing champion Joe Louis — and was married from 1955 to 1958.
She was the principal philanthropist of the principal post-1955 New York Black-American hair-care-education community — and founded the principal Trim-Away Figure Contouring Beauty School at Harlem in 1957.
She operated the principal Rose-Meta House of Beauty at Harlem from 1945 to 1980 — and the principal Trim-Away Figure Contouring Beauty School at Harlem from 1957 to 1985.
She died at New York on the sixteenth of December 2008 of natural causes, at ninety-six.
She is honored here as the founder of the Rose-Meta House of Beauty at Harlem.
Curated with honor.
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