Vintage Tips on Mustache Maintenance from the London Handlebar Club
Vintage Tips on Mustache Maintenance from the London Handlebar Club
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Caption from LIFE. At Temple Public House, club members hold formal beer session. The mustaches in the picture on their wall have been taped on.Nat Farbman—The LIFE Picture Collection/Getty Images
Since the early-2000s establishment of Movember—an annual fundraising competition to raise money for prostate cancer—November has come to be associated with the sprouting of mustaches where once there were none. But for serious growers of facial hair, October is the month that matters. At the World Beard and Moustache Championships, held this year in Leogang, Austria, from Oct. 2 through Oct. 4., slender Dalís will compete with bushy Imperials for the title of greatest ‘stache.
In celebration of these feats of facial hair, LIFE revisits the London Handlebar Club, which in the 1940s offered a safe space for those who sported exuberant whiskers. At meetings, members shared tips for preventing an upsweep (clip-on weights) and dealing with a mustache misshapen from sleep (sleep on your back, not your face). One particularly troublesome ailment was the “Boozer’s Droop,” a side effect of “too much immersion in alcohol during the mustache’s early development.” The cure? “Stop drinking. Short of that, shave.”
Liz Ronk, who edited this gallery, is the Photo Editor for LIFE.com. Follow her on Twitter @lizabethronk.
Caption from LIFE. At Temple Public House, club members hold formal beer session. The mustaches in the picture on their wall have been taped on. Nat Farbman—The LIFE Picture Collection/Getty ImagesCaption from LIFE. Splay puss is common mustache ailment of wind-tunnel workers, dive bombers who forget oxygen masks. The only cures: glue or clothespins.Nat Farbman—The LIFE Picture Collection/Getty ImagesMembers of the London Handlebar Club, 1947.Nat Farbman—The LIFE Picture Collection/Getty ImagesCaption from LIFE. Right-wing low is the result of sleeping on one side or resting head on the arm. Cure: sleep on back. Ironing with damp cloths will not work.Nat Farbman—The LIFE Picture Collection/Getty ImagesCaption from LIFE. Mustache old school tie is displayed by Handlebar Club members Anthony Noel Snell (left) and Baron Christian de Beer. Extremist members like these have even put some form of the motif on their handkerchiefs.Nat Farbman—The LIFE Picture Collection/Getty ImagesMember of the London Handlebar Club, 1947.Nat Farbman—The LIFE Picture Collection/Getty ImagesCaption from LIFE. Upsweep is found among elevator operators, men who wear polo shirts and parachutists who favor delayed openings. The cure: clip-on weights.Nat Farbman—The LIFE Picture Collection/Getty ImagesMember of the London Handlebar Club, 1947.Nat Farbman—The LIFE Picture Collection/Getty ImagesCaption from LIFE. Boozer's droop comes from too much immersion in alcohol during the mustache's early development. Cure: stop drinking. Short of that, shave.Nat Farbman—The LIFE Picture Collection/Getty ImagesCaption from LIFE. Mustache kiss includes the danger of having the kiss turn into a tickle. Cofounder "Raff" Hooper found that while mustache added to his appeal to opposite sex, it occasionally caused an embarrassing sneeze as well.Nat Farbman—The LIFE Picture Collection/Getty ImagesMembers of the London Handlebar Club, 1947.Nat Farbman—The LIFE Picture Collection/Getty ImagesCaption from LIFE. Mustache kiss includes the danger of having the kiss turn into a tickle. Cofounder "Raff" Hooper found that while mustache added to his appeal to opposite sex, it occasionally caused an embarrassing sneeze as well.Nat Farbman—The LIFE Picture Collection/Getty ImagesMembers of the London Handlebar Club, 1947.Nat Farbman—The LIFE Picture Collection/Getty Images
