Taylor Weldon, VP Media & PR: Austin Facial Hair Club

by Bill Alley, Broadcast Host, Wordsmith and Beard Advocate

Right now, beard competing is making history. From the time competing began in the 1990s, whiskered men have grown a little gathering into the first 3-day “plus” extravaganza of facial hair. Austin, Texas gets to be the break-out event that gets more categories, more time, and more socializing. All three are necessary ingredients in spreading out a good time into a really, really good weekend.

Out of the gate the Yeards compete at the meet and greet social Thursday, August 31st with the gathering a great launch for year-long growers to show off their skills. It’s also a chance for these guys to gear up for other competitions they’ve entered. The Moustaches, Craft/Fantasy and Whiskerinas (ladies who make up beards or have actual beards grown) will have their moment Friday. Saturday, partial beard judging takes center stage first, followed by full beard competing. Sunday, it’s all about freestyle facial hair and the ‘best in show’.

Then, there’s the city. According to Paul Hendricks, Austin Facial Hair Club emcee, the businesses, restaurants, food trucks and watering holes are sensing something special. The AFHC has put the city on the map as it has been gathering attention for years from major media, but this atmosphere feels much more welcoming, if not ‘growing’. Hendricks admits you’ll find as many bearded folk as not, and many of us in Central Texas have seen venues and shops where the whiskered outnumber the shorn. Austin is a very compact inner city, quite walkable; from the prestigious Long Center contestants and attendees have an ease of getting to places on foot, by a number of cab services, and even by cycle or foot driven rickshaws. One of the rickshaws reveals a formidable beard who will drop everything at just the right moment to compete—an AFHC member.

Our Internet radio station KNGY-DB/Temple TX has the broadcast of special event moments which will be posted at the website – including photos, audio and video segments with a ‘roundup’ article set for the October Beardsley Gazette.

Catch the podcast interview with Paul Hendricks in the Beardsley Radio section.

Break the Shave and Stop The Endless Habit

by Bill Alley, Broadcast Host, Wordsmith and Beard Advocate

We were shopping earlier this month, and one of the things we do casually is notice how many men grow whiskers compared to shaving. There are some days Central Texas could hold its own Beard Convention with the number of gents appearing, ‘beard nodding’, and conversing. These guys did what all of us do: got to the point where shaving was pointless, expensive, old, tired, unwanted and unneeded. We all got to that place where we declared no more to the old ways and routine.

For me, that has a date: September 27th, 1987. That was the day I tossed every bit of shaving devices and ‘skin soothers’ out—giving one razor a well deserved stomp on the tile floor, hearing it crunch like a cockroach. What a lovely sound.

We’re in line at this one shop and I notice a guy standing off to our left, not quite in line but trying to line up and remove the deepening set of white whiskers against a ruddy face and reddish-graying hair on top. All the evidence was ‘in hand’: shaving cream and cheap plastic razors. Standing right next to us in line, we talked up the World Beard & Moustache Competition to our favorite cashier who has known us since moving to the city. She was all ears, and I was silently hoping the man about to ‘do the deed’ was also listening.

Later that night, local TV news announced that three more suspects were being rounded up from the melee a few years back which turned a biker bar in Waco into the biggest gunfight in recent Texas history. One of those men had a close resemblance to the man in line. Could it be? We’re just 30 minutes from said bar. It would be a reason for a man to shave.

Yes, I found a reason—to escape the law. Extreme as it is, whisker disfigurement might be the only misguided justification. Fall is the perfect time to re-assess why you do what you do. School’s return, the longer work weeks, endless routines (wasted time shaving) and smartphone reminders telling you what to do and when to do it get downright annoying; why not stop the one habit that can let the real you grow through? For some men the days will be shorter, nights much colder, that your own personal ‘hair scarf’ will make the chilly days bearable, if not enjoyable. Escaping the cold? Now that makes better sense.

Beards of the Far East and Southeast Asia

Seventh in a year-long series devoted to the ethnicity and culture of the Beard. by Bill Alley, Broadcast Host, Wordsmith and Beard Advocate

If thoughts of Asia and Beards seem foreign, this part of our ongoing Ethnic Beard Series will help create the association, and we’re using History to accomplish that.

Let’s take this virtual journey to the northernmost point of Japan (which, coincidentally is the southernmost point of Russia nearby). The South Asian Ainu tribe which traditionally occupies Hokkiado, Japan and villages in the southernmost tip of Russia’s nearby island chain are this hirsute link to Japanese ethnicity. They are not many in number, with estimates of tens of thousands to several hundred thousands living, nor have they secured the typical aspect of what Japanese men appear to be. Much of this was due to their ancestral lands being incorporated into the Emperor dynasties of the 18th century forward where inclusion was given but with strict adherence to the more refined custom of the state expected. Only recently (within the past 25 years) have the Ainu been liberated from layers of disdain.

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[Photo: Ainu Man circa 1880, Baron Raimund von Stillfried, Public Domain. Source: https://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/File:AinuManStilflied.JPG]

Custom for Ainu men is to stop any shaving by adulthood and the women will adapt to tattoo their upper lip to form a black moustache—a sign of Ainu womanhood. Women and men shared duties of family life, with the men having solo responsibility for religious leadership or village affairs.

Venturing into the Asian dynasties, there are significant numbers of Emperors and other leaders with facial hair. A sizable number of Chinese Emperors were wearing facial hair from thinner, lengthier lines (eventually to be called the Fu Manchu look—the name dubbed in Hollywood) to full beards.

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Confucius

Confucius, arguably the most revered of all Chinese men of thought and culture, maintained a healthy beard his entire life. Though many Chinese have genes predisposed against being hairy, a number of men have grown impressive facial hair due to family lineage or the regions they inhabit. From what I’ve noticed men from South China, rural farms and far west China will grow facial hair.

Let’s take a look at another culture which may surprise you. The Asian Islands have men who can produce good looking and even dense facial hair. One example is found in the galleries at Cornell University in New York. The depiction—a Korean boatman taking a break while sailing, is a 1904 caption which offers great detail to the level of relaxed, untouched hair and whisker growth the man achieved.

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[Collection: Willard D.Straight in Korea–Date:ca.1904;Public Domain,from the Division of Rare and Manuscript Collections,Cornell University Library]

Taking his likeness into today’s society he would be perceived as quite natural in facial appearance. The commentary on Willard Straight’s encounter of the gentleman reads: “Korean sailor takes a break from transporting cargo and people, sitting under the shadow from the sail, smoking from his long bamboo pipe. He wears cool hemp clothes.”

Perception often plays tricks, as does order, custom and other political and religious adaptations. Only when we consider culture and history do clear truths surface. Though certain peoples and bloodlines have hindrances to the growth and density of facial hair, humanity has far more examples of bearded men which have convinced me of the need to continue this Ethnic Beard series for the understanding and enlightenment of people.