THE HISTORY OF THE COMBOVER

• Thursday January 5, 2006 in: Hair Tag(s):
  The combover is not just a temporary solution to hair loss---it is a cultural phenomenon that was patented over 26 years ago. This is the story of entrepreneurship and vision.

  This is the story of Donald and Frank Smith of Orlando, Florida and their quest for the perfect male baldness treatment.

  This inspiring story of industriousness and American ingenuity began sometime in 1977 when the late Frank Smith was discussing his readily apparent hair loss with his son Donald over a bottle of wine. In vino veritas ('In wine there is truth') or something Latin like that.

  According to the AP, Donald noticed that his father may have had significant hair loss up on top of his scalp but had plenty of hair on the sides.

  Could the hair on the sides be grown extra long and used to comb over on top of the scalp to disguise the existing hair loss?

  An idea was born. Frank and Donald decided to patent their revolutionary hair loss solution and sent in comprehensive drawings to the US Patent office.

  Amazingly these were accepted and the patent for the combover rested solely with the Smith boys.

  Unfortunately their dream of selling hair spray that would help keep the combover never materialized and the patent expired in 1998.

  It was not until 2004 with the Ig-Nobel awards of Harvard University that the father/son invention team of Donald and Frank Smith were recognized for their innovation and the world was reminded that the combover was more than just an extremely ineffective way to deal with hair loss...it was a vision conceived by two drunk men hoping to change the world.

  Though the vision kinda crumbled as advancements in hair transplant technology specifically bald scalp reduction evolved. But there's a lesson here somewhere.

  Moral of the story? Like Edgar Allan Poe a little booze goes a long way towards boosting one's ingenuity.

  
  Anway excuse me while I chug some bottles here...of soda that is....