BKFK Home Page | BKFK Kids | Inventors | Walker, Madame C.J.

Madame CJ Walker

Entrepreneur

• Famous African American inventor and entrepreneur Sarah Breedlove McWilliams Walker, better known as Madame CJ Walker, was born in rural Louisiana.
• Orphaned at 7, Walker worked the cotton fields and later as a laundry woman. Walker suffered a scalp ailment that caused her to lose some of her hair.
• Embarrassed by her appearance, she began experimenting with various home remedies, eventually creating and selling Madam Walker's Wonderful Hair Grower, a scalp conditioning and healing formula.
• The business that Madame Walker created with her famous beauty products employed as many as 3,000 people. Her creativity and ambition led her to be the first known African-American woman to become a self-made millionaire.