Can wrinkle removers remove wrinkles? By SIDNEY MARGOLIUS HE COSMETICS and toilet- tries industry has become the big boom business to- day, with stockmarket specula- tors reaping a bonanza while women have been subjected to successive high-pressure promo- tions of expensive toiletries, es- pecially those promising to smooth away wrinkles. The latest promotion for a miracle wrinkle cream is Helene Curtis’ “Magic Secret,’ which contains what a company pub- licity representative says is an “animal protein ingredient,” and which outsiders say is oxblood. It carries a fantastic price of $5 for one-fifth of an ounce. This comes to $25'an: ounce or $400 a pound. The vision of another killing like Revlon’s highly-profitable success has made Wall Street speculators frantic to get in on the Helene Curtis ground floor. The scent of money, even if tainted with oxblood, skyrocket- ed the price of Helene Curtis stock from $18 a share to $42. Then rumors started to move around Wall Street, that (1) the U.S. Food & Drug Administra- tion was planning an investiga- tion and (2) we were planning an article deflating the new cream. The speculators got even more frantic and the stock plummet- ed. We even got a series of calls from a leading brockerage house to find out if we were writing a story on the new skin cream and whether the brokerage house should advise its clients to sell their Helene Curtis stock. It’s alarming to see not only this new threat to the pocket- book of anxious women, but “TRAVEL VISIT MOSCOW and other cities in the Soviet Union Special Ist Class Rates Only $15.00 Per Day contact: GLOBE TOURS 615 SELKIRK AVE. - WINNIPEG, MANITOBA - JU. 6-1886 FREE: travel bag with every overseas air ticket. SO OP FSGS DOL SGI ITS eye GLOBE_TO ie LENINGRAD how Wall Street, one of the pil- lars of our economy, reacts vio- lently to rumors. , The FDA is keeping an eye on the promotion of this latest “wrinkle” lotion to see if any claims are made that violate the law, advises Wallace Janssen, FDA Director of Information. A Helene Curtis representative told us that “Magic Secret’ is a clear liquid that ‘will smooth away wrinkles and lines about five or 10 minutes after applica- tion, and that the effect lasts for eight hours, The liquid can be reactivated on the face by moistening with water.” After eight or 10 days, the company claims, the effect lasts longer. Demonstrations on mod- els were said to have found that the ‘skin tends to respond bet- ter and longer” after continued use of “Magic Secret.” Market- ing tests produced excellent sales results, so the company is going ahead full steam, another representative reported. However, any ordinary facial cream, even cold cream, has a temporary smoothing effect. A new booklet, released by FDA, called “Your Money and Your Life,’ says: “There are no creams, lotions, masks or plas- ters that will prevent, correct or remove wrinkles.” The booklet also warns: “Par- ticularly beware of cosmetics promoted on the basis of some new special ingredient “scienti- fically” found to have remark- able effects.” Cosmetics manufacturers have developed creams with all kinds of ingredients claimed to im- prove complexions or remove wrinkles, Janssen reports. One recent promotion was for a cream containing plankton from a certain spring in France. URS AGENCY 3 Another face cream was bas- ed on goats’ milk, and not just ordinary goats but a special breed of Swiss goats. Another manufacturer promoted turtle oil. “Actually,” Janssen points out, “turtles themselves have the worst complexion of all.” Wrinkle creams are not the only bonanza of cosmetics man- ufacturers, but they are one of the most important. The company that has man- aged to cash in on the modern toiletries craze most success- fully is Revlon, with a host of high-priced products, including anti-wrinkle Eterna 27. Reylon products, even though costlier than many other brands, account for one-fourth of all sales of cos- metics by drug and department stores, and stores are actively policed to prevent price-cutting. Sales of this company spiraled from $29. million a year in 1953 to $160 million in 1962, which shows the current extent of family spending on cosme- tics and toiletries. Revlon is now reported to spend $25 million a year just on TV advertising, or over 16 cents of every dollar you pay for their products, One of the most-persistent and continuing promotions is for creams and other products con- taining royal jelly, sold in stores, by door-to-door salesmen and by mail. FDA Commissioner George P. Larrick called royal jelly “an- other example of exploitation of outlandish exotic substances as miracle ingredients,” Royal jelly is a substance sec- reted by bees and fed by them to chosen larvae who grow sev- eral times as large as worker bees to become “queen” bees, laying tremendous numbers of eggs. The false theory, promoted for years, is that if royal jelly bene- fited the bees in such a way it must be good for humans, FDA said in reporting a court deci- sion ordering the destruction of a shipment of royal jelly pro- ducts. aed It may do you no harm to smear oxblood or other animal protein on your face, except the loss of valuable dollars. But the use of hormones and antibiotics in face creams does worry the medical profession. Doctors are concerned that indiscriminate use of antibiotics on the skin could prove harmful. — Nor has it ever been proved that any drug such as hormones, antibiotics or vitamins, when in- corporated into cosmetics, can improve the appearance of non- diseased skin, the Committee on Cosmetics of the American Me- dical Association has said, —RWDSU Record. She’s kitten-cute But you’re far older And yet she smiled So you grow bolder, -.- Your cheeks grow hot Your hopes grow colder: « She meant the lad - Behind your shoulder. JN MY Nova SCOTIA DAYs I spoke many times in the mining towns. When I learned a group of Communists there had christened their club Wallace 1 was more eX cited than astonished. I woke up next morning realizing they meant the great Scottish national hero, William Wallace. Growing more modest as time has taught me, ! look down at the Executive office seat below and don’t for # moment dream that the W alongside it refers to me. It ‘ rather as Coopers advertise it, for the:king — meaning © bosses naturally. Picture him in it toiling away while ee are skylarking along a hig ‘i way behind a diesel, a .in-a cozy mine drilling 1° silicosis, or 10 stories ey tossing rivets to a fel es Iroqouis and enjoying 4 © Ae manding view of the coum try for miles around. ‘ joice that you are onli hand while he is the ee If any Red looks at that $7 and says: “you mean hind,” throw him out: It was from just, suc Ar tycoon seat that a_ toiling ve - $235.00 rose to address a Chamber of Commerce meeting fr manuscript which he had not checked after his secret@ty handed it to him. ___ _ The business man is tired,” he boomed, “tired of Eee ing to keep Canada on an even keel, tired of fighting tax that undermine free enterprise, tired of dealing with pee eering unions. But not half as tired as I am at havin type this drivel for you.” 1864-1964 History's most challenging century The special August issue of WORLD MAXiST REVIEW is dedicated to the Centenary of THE FIRST INTERNATIONAL founded by Marx and Engels, September 28, 1864. Leading world Communists deal with the astounding development 2 100 years of working-class internationalism. + issue: SUBSCRIBE NOW and make sure that you have a copy of this invaluable ! $3.50 per year; §5 for 18 issues; single copy 35c. + em @ subscriber to World Marxist Review you will also receive the n : ermation Bulletin, supplement to World Marxist Review + order from PROGRESS BOOKS 4 STAFFORD ST., TORONTW. 3, CANADA a : mend ; _Pag? September 4, 1964—PACIFIC TRIBUNE Papeete seer seabinan sare seanenmetae sete eee oe rise ere eee ee ae F— oe) Be oS Po nena sont fag oO z oJ oO ~ 5 oi wast