Hunt Co., TX - News: Lenna's Beauty Shop Celebrates 50th ******************************************************** This file was contributed for use in the USGenWeb by: Sarah Swindell USGenWeb Archives. Copyright. All rights reserved http://www.usgwarchives.net/copyright.htm ******************************************************** Lenna's Beauty Shop Celebrates 50th Year Anniversary Lenna Belle Compton Barr and her sister, Frances Compton Woodruff, opened Compton's Beauty Shop on August 18, 1945. Lenna has operated the shop for fifty years as of Friday, August 18, 1995. The two sisters attended Neilson Beauty College in Oak Cliff from December of 1944 to July of 1945. After traveling to Austin to take the state examination, the sisters opened the beauty shop on the southside of US Highway 69 in downtown Celeste. Frances did the ladies' hair and Lenna cut the children's hair. Hair cuts were $1.00 to $3.00 and a shampoo and set was fifty cents. As a child, Lenna wanted to be an artist, but her father, Lum Compton, wouldn't hear of such a thing. As a beauty operator, she has been able to put her artistic ability into a different style. Lenna describes herself as very "bashful and timid" in those days, and left it up to her sister to answer the shop's phone. When the shop opened, the technique was to roll hair on hair pins, the "wide bobby pins." In the fifties, hair was rolled on bobby pins and clippies, and then rollers came into use. Lenna does not own nor does she advocate the use of a blow dryer. The sisters opened the shop in 1945 as one way to make a living that was not picking cotton. Lenna stayed with the shop, and Frances married a farmer, Dempsey Woodruff, and left the shop after a year and six months. When asked when Lenna plans to retire? "Just sometime," she remarked. Lenna's Beauty Shop is the oldest business in Celeste with the exception of the bank (First Bank of Celeste). Her shop to this day is filled with memories of the town and her early family life in the country. She keeps pictures and clippings of key events. She also still has the "croquignole," an early permanent wave machine. A reception for her fifty years of service will be held this Saturday, August 19, from twelve noon until two o'clock at the shop. Three picture captions: Lenna Compton Barr is picture in her shop in downtown Celeste. Sybil Alexander Hutcheson has been coming to Lenna's shop off and on for forty-five years. On Friday, August 11th, Lenna combs out Sybil's hair. She does not use a curling iron or blow dryer and said "she won't". (Staff Photos) Pictured above is Frances and Lenna when the two sisters opened their shop in downtown Celeste on August 18, 1945. A special reception for the fifty years in business will be held Saturday, August 19, 1995, from twelve noon until two o'clock. See related article. (Lenna Compton collection) (August, 1995, The Leonard Graphic) ---