Kemetri: Honoring Madam C.J. Walker and African American Lineage of Greatness.

Our History: Built on Legacy, Resilience, and Vision

Long before Black hair care was recognized by mainstream science or commerce, African American entrepreneurs were experimenting, formulating, healing, and building empires from kitchen laboratories and community networks. Our journey is rooted in that sacred tradition—one pioneered most powerfully by Madam C.J. Walker, and carried forward by countless Black visionaries who transformed necessity into innovation.

Madam C.J. Walker: A Vision Born in Oppression

Born Sarah Breedlove in 1867 to formerly enslaved parents, Madam C.J. Walker came into a world shaped by both the promise of Reconstruction and the brutal reality of Jim Crow America. Orphaned at a young age, married as a teenager, widowed early, and working as a laundress to survive, she lived at the intersection of poverty, racism, and sexism. Black women of her era were excluded from formal education, financial institutions, and nearly all avenues of economic mobility.

Yet from these harsh conditions, she observed a widespread crisis within her community: Black women were suffering from severe scalp disease, hair loss, and untreated conditions caused by poor living conditions, lack of medical access, and no products formulated for their unique hair and scalp needs. What society ignored, Madam C.J. Walker studied.

Through experimentation, observation, and persistence, she developed her own formula to restore scalp health and stimulate hair growth. What began as survival became vision.

The Rise of an Empire

Madam C.J. Walker did more than create products—she built infrastructure for Black economic independence. She founded the Walker Manufacturing Company, trained and employed thousands of Black women as licensed “Walker Agents,” and created one of the first national sales networks run entirely by African American women.

At a time when Black women were denied professional dignity, she offered:

• Entrepreneurship

• Financial independence

• Education and leadership

• Pride in self-care and presentation

By the early 1900s, her company had become a national enterprise, with factories, beauty schools, and distribution throughout the United States, the Caribbean, and Central America. She became one of the first self-made female millionaires in American history, not through inheritance, but through science, strategy, and service to her people.

Beyond Wealth: A Legacy of Resistance and Reinvestment

Madam C.J. Walker used her wealth as a tool for racial uplift and justice. She donated generously to Black schools, orphanages, churches, the NAACP, and anti-lynching efforts. She funded political activism at a time when doing so as a Black woman invited danger. Her success was never detached from her responsibility to the community.

She proved that Black hair was not a liability—it was an industry, a science, and an economic engine.

Honoring Every Black Hair Entrepreneur

While Madam C.J. Walker stands as a global symbol, she was not alone. Behind her, beside her, and after her came thousands of African American hair entrepreneurs—chemists without laboratories, scientists without degrees, business owners without bank loans. They learned through:

• Observation

• Trial and error

• Botanical knowledge

• Community feedback

• Ancestral wisdom

From beauty shops that doubled as community centers, to home formulators who created oils, pomades, creams, and herbal tonics, Black hair care has always been a form of applied science and cultural preservation.

Every coil, loc, braid, and curl carried not just beauty—but economics, resistance, and self-definition.

Our Place in This Lineage

We stand today on the shoulders of these pioneers. Their courage allows us to speak openly about the science of Black hair, to honor the Earth’s gifts, and to build brands unapologetically centered on our people.

Kemetri exists in this unbroken line of legacy:

• Where Madam C.J. Walker proved it was possible

• Where generations of Black entrepreneurs made it sustainable

• And where we now carry it forward with modern chemistry, ancestral respect, and cultural pride

We do not simply sell products. We steward our traditions. We continue our science. We protect our legacy.

Black hair built empires. Black science sustained them. Black beauty will always rise. #BLACKISBEAUTIFUL #AFROLOVE