Razors & blades
The Gillette “Big Fellow” cost $5 with twelve blades. The $7 combination set added shaving soap and a brush to a standard razor and blades.
History & Ephemera
Shaving goods in old catalogues, advertisements and newspaper clippings.
What Canadians could buy from Eaton’s
Fall & Winter 1920–21
Selected finds from the 1920–21 catalogue. Prices as printed.
Shaving & aftercare
Cameo’s Shaver’s Friend came as talcum, cream or lotion. The lotion, sold for use after shaving, started at 32¢.
Tonics & scented waters
Eaton’s Bay Rum cost 32¢ for three ounces and was advertised as a head rub or after-shaving lotion. It shared the page with brilliantine and rum-and-quinine hair tonic.
Eaton’s Fall & Winter Catalogue, 1920–21, pages 382, 426 and 428. Toronto Public Library scan, via Wikimedia Commons.
Browse the complete catalogue at Toronto Public Library →
View the catalogue on Wikimedia Commons →
More catalogue finds
Seven dull blades for 25¢
The $1 Gem Junior came with seven blades, a stropping attachment and a case. Seven dull blades could be exchanged for 25¢, provided they were not nicked.
A seven-cent cake of shaving soap
Williams’ Barber’s Bar cost 7¢ a cake. The same list offered Williams’ Travellers’ Stick at 20¢, Pears’ shaving sticks from 25¢ and Cuticura shaving soap at 15¢.
A shaving kit by post
Simpson’s offered this Ever-Ready “army kit” for $1: a safety razor and six blades in a khaki roll-up case.
Assorted advertisements
Colgate Comforts,
Canadian Pictorial, Vol. 3, No. 8 · July 1908
This full-page Colgate advertisement includes a shaving stick among a rather spectacular assortment of soaps, powders and toiletries. Readers could send for trial packages at the company’s Montreal address.
View the original on CanadianaCanadian Pictorial, Vol. 3, No. 8, p. 28
Source details — Colgate Comforts
Canadian Pictorial, Vol. 3, No. 8, p. 28. Library and Archives Canada.
Military Shaving
Newspaper clippings and one surviving kit show how razors reached Canadian soldiers during the two world wars.
Razors for Troops Fighting at the Front
A call for spare razors, with letters from Toronto and Sheffield and a list of collection points in Moncton. Donors could leave their razors at local shops or the Moncton Club.
Source details — Razors for Troops Fighting at the Front
Original publication not yet identified.
Razors for the Soldiers
Thirty-two more razors collected in Fredericton were reportedly sent to Lyman’s Limited in Montreal for forwarding to troops. An earlier shipment had contained twenty-six.
Source details — Razors for the Soldiers
Original publication not yet identified.
Safety Razors for Soldiers
Residents of McKee’s Mills raised money for five safety razors, one for each of five local men who had enlisted. The men are named; the razor brand is not.
Source details — Safety Razors for Soldiers
Original publication not yet identified.
A Gillette ‘Khaki Set’
A razor, a field mirror and a case marked R-189737. The Canadian Grenadier Guards Museum associates this kit with the 22nd Canadian Armoured Regiment during the Second World War.
See the kit at the Canadian Grenadier Guards Museum
Source details — Gillette ‘Khaki Set’
Lieutenant Michael A. Hayes-Rivet, retired, The Gillette ‘Khaki Set’ Canadian Issued Shaving Kit During WW2, .