Mrs. Claire Mitchell		The only semi-fashionable thing about Birmingham, she said, was Tuxedo Junction. And even then, in spite of its deceptively formal sounding name, most people wore the same clothes to the clubs that they wore to school–neat, but not fancy. Because many clothes came from factories in the Northern United States, she rarely noticed marked differences in Southern and Northern clothing styles, except those dictated by the year-round balmy weather in the South. Efforts at fashion were frustrated, however, by the South's rigid policies of segregation. While African Americans could buy from downtown department stores, they could neither try on clothes before purchasing nor return them if they did not fit. As a result, people often had to settle for poorly fitting or uncomfortable clothing.
The wife of Quitman Mitchell, mayor of Bessemer, Claire Mitchell owns and operates the Bessemer Beauty College. A life-long resident of Alabama, Mitchell's parents came to the Birmingham area from Green County, Alabama. When she was growing up, she always had to wear fairly formal dresses to school and to church, and she loved her poodle skirt and bobby socks. Unlike many girls and women, however, she never liked hats or wore a lot of makeup and nail polish. Although people she knew always dressed neatly, especially to church or school, she never considered Birmingham a fashionable city. "Atlanta, yes, places like that were more known to fashion, but not Birmingham."	A girl wearing a poodle skirt similar to the kind worn and loved by Claire Mitchell

Mrs. Mitchell, center, with staff members, Bessemer Beauty College

Like many of the hair dressers and barbers we interviewed, Claire Mitchell had not originally planned to work in a beauty salon. As a teenager in the 1960s, Mitchell took cosmetology classes at Jackson-Olin High School, but had far more interest in nursing than in beauty. When the administrators of the Nursing School put her on a waiting list, however, she decided to try cosmetology school for a year, just until she re-enrolled in Nursing School the next fall. After a year in cosmetology school, however, she decided that she wanted to work in a beauty salon for her career. Before Mitchell opened her own shop, she worked at Rice's Beauty Shop.

"Beauty and barber shops are easy for black people to go into," and "there are very little expenses" to start your own salon, "so that's why there's a lot of them around here." Now Claire Mitchell runs the Bessemer Beauty College, where she teaches courses and continues to cut and style hair. She has noticed in the recent past that hair styles that once relied on heavy chemicals have faded from fashion, and her clients now prefer a more natural look. And unlike her experiences as a child, she says it is no longer common for non-professionals to get extra money by doing hair in their homes.

The Bessemer Beauty College