Remembering IOOMRF

A fine gentleman with a fine mustache, but the historical heft of this image is on his lapel. It is a rare photograph of an International Order of Mustache Relief Fellows membership pin. Every major city in the civilized world had a IOOMRF chapter house, ready to lend a hand to mustachioed and unmustached alike. This fine men were all pillars of their community and lead by example of their fine mustaches. They would give lectures on mustache grooming and public demonstrations of mustache safety procedures. They were also known for their fund drives and parades, raising money for widows, orphans, and the medically unmustache. Unfortunately, changing styles and the electric razor took their toll on the membership at large and the organization is largely forgotten.

In recent years, though, a number of like-mided organizations, both literal and spiritual descendants of IOOMRF, have sprung up. If you would like to support mustaches in your area, I urge you to seek out organizations like Mustaches For Kids, Team Mo-Mentum, and Fund-A-Stache. Fine folks doing fine work, and keeping the mustache alive.

The Properly Populated Philtrum

Now this is a fine and dense philtrum, brooking no argument from the whithers or tips.

The Balding Philtrum

Another view of the grotesque effects of a malformed philtrum.

Once again I must show you a mustache with pronounced pugilistic effect. I would beg the forbearance of my loyal readers with delicate constitutions.

Edison's Folly: Better Mustaches Through Science

As best I can discover, this is the only know photographic evidence of the amazing, yet dangerous effects of Thomas Edison's Electromustacherizer that saw its first and only public demonstration at the 1893 Chicago World's Fair. These men started the day clean-shaven and grew these fine mustaches in just a few minutes under the influence of Edison's machine. But, just as the rays of the mighty sun struck Icarus low, their mustaches were mere guttering flames that fell out in clumps just three days later. In a saddening result, Edison's folly rendered these men mustacheless for the rest of their days.

In his despair, Edison spent the rest of his lonely days electrocuting elephants and yelling at rotating wax cylinders. Unable to sleep for more than an hour at a stretch due to his burning guilt for mutilating these men, Edison died penniless and alone in a Rhode Island boarding house not two years later.

Plain, But Respectable

It is a shame that he does not capitalize on the wonderful density and tall philtrum and whithers Nature has provided him.

The Unattractiveness of Indecision

This--I hesitate to say gentleman--has a thin, patchy mustache and flared sideburns. It is either a failed attempt at the noble faceshelf or a fatal indecision on his part of facial hair styles. The shifty look in his eyes even indicates he might be thinking of mustachelessness. The generous among you might assign his rough appearance to a mustache wasting disease, but I've seen his kind before. Shocking.

Finally, Some Sanity In An Insane World

New York City police have been banned from all facial hair except for mustaches.

As wise man notes in the article:

"Appearance is so important in any kind of authoritative role," said Jim Curran, who was a cop in the 1960s and now teaches at the John Jay College of Criminal Justice. "Police officers should be clean. They should look nice. The Patrol Guide emphasizes that for a reason."

The best way to look nice? A mustache, of course!

It is sensible, though, to allow undercover officers to retain their various beards. They do mingle with outcasts and criminals of society and it would not do to look out-of-place.

Fade, Fading Away

This gentleman's mustache is ghostly and barely there, as if were camouflaging itself from the dread North American Hook-Beaked Mustache Swallow. A brilliant example of microevolutionary adaptation. Bravo!

Monday Morning Amazing

One of the most fabulous faceshelves I have ever discovered! What wit, wealth and women this gentleman must have enjoyed!

The Modern Mustache

A very forward looking mustache from a very forward looking man.

The Sad Mustache

I cannot decide if he is morose that his mustache barely makes it down his face for a proper lip waterfall (often vulgarly called a Fu Manchu in the modern era) or if his visible distress is due to a catastrophic state of flaccidity in what should have been a spectacular overhand twist.

The Mustache of a Scholar, Surely

The gentleman has two of the most subtle overhand twists I ever encountered. In fact, I do not think they can even be considered to employ a twist at all.

Pressing Question Answered

I thought I might pause a moment and take time to answer a faithful reader's question. It seems a fine pursuit on a day when the weather is so unmustachely.

(lord) franko said...
as someone struggling with a long-ish moustache, i just have to ask: good LORD, how did this man EAT?? i am constantly getting food in my 'stache, or 'stache in my food, or both in my mouth... it's en embarrassing spectacle to live through, and probably even worse for those around me to watch. i'm considering either (gasp!) shaving off my moustache in 2008, or staying indoors and eating alone forever. how in the world did men from that era get so huge with moustaches so robust -- it boggles the mind.
December 30, 2007 12:50 PM

Firstly, I counsel against any rash mustache butchery on your part. A well-trimmed mustache will admit as gross an amount of foodstuffs as any state of barelippedness. (Why, in fact, do the determinedly barelipped eat at all? An unmustached life may not be worth living for any proper gentleman.)

To your question: There were two main methods by which a Victorian gentleman might deal with his mustache at mealtime. For formal occasions is was common to style the whiskers up and away from the mouth for the sake of neatness and expediency. Since formal mustache portraits would rarely be shot at dinner parties, a modern example with have to suffice.




A different method was often employed privately in the home or at sup with intimates, the humble face cage. Its purpose was to lift and separate the mustache, holding it out of the way to admit the various cold meat forks or monkey spoons one might wish to employ.

No Victorian gentleman would have allowed himself to be photographed in his face cage; it would be as unthinkable as a lady displaying her whalebone bustle for an albuminist. So, unfortunately, all I can offer for visual reference is this crude Photo-Shoppe recreation.

New Year's Day Special Edition: A Famous Mustache Extravaganza

Five of my personal favorite famous mustaches from The Golden Age of Mustaches.



The Mustache that Attempted to Tame The West. The candle that burns twice as bright burns half as long. (A man undertaking such a series of adventures can be forgiven the occasional lower lip hair.)



The wild, wonderful, Whitmantorial splendor of Mr. Samuel Clemens' artfully unkempt mustache is worth all the riverboat stories in the world to me.



Hounded by his own Demons at every turn, Edgar Allan Poe still found time to cultivate a neat and civilized mustache. Would that his descendants in fantastical literary pursuits have the same fortitude.



No faithful reader of this blog is ignorant of the amazing life and times of President Chester A. Arthur. Long may his magnificent faceshelf loom in history.



Finally, what more can be said about dear Nietzsche that one glance at his stupendous mustache cannot tell you? When you gaze long into his mustache, his mustache gazes into you...

May Two Thousand and Eight find you and yours mustached, happy, and free.