quick clicks

preteenagers today articles

preteenagers today q&a

teenagers today articles

teenagers today q&a

community & groups

research baby names

prepare a birth plan

content channels

ip channel rss feeds

read birth stories

read parenting stories

recommended books

e-newsletters

safety recalls

ip diaries

ip store

mom of the month

dad of the month

editor's letter

letters to the editor

Shaving 101

A Primer for Moms of Teen Boys

By Charlene Torkelson

A male with a hairless face is nothing new. Even Neanderthal cavemen plucked the hair from their faces thousands of years ago. Beard or no beard has been a fashion question for centuries. In 500 B.C., Alexander the Great set the trend for men in Greece. His choice was short hair and a shaved face. Alexander wouldn't even go into battle with the hint of stubble on his chin.

Roman men were shaved by tonsors (barbers). Wealthy men had personal tonsors. Others even slaves went to the barber daily for a shave, a hair cut and the latest gossip. The equipment was of such poor quality and so clumsy to use they never shaved themselves, preferring to have someone else do it. At 21, Roman males were ritually inducted into manhood with a party and a first shave. Julius Caesar even used tweezers to remove his facial hair!

During the middle ages when we typically consider the style to be bearded, William of Normandy successfully invaded England with the help of a shave. His conquest was due to Harold the Saxon's men mistaking the Norman soldiers for priests because of their shaved faces and short hair. The rest is history, as they say.

History aside, the art of shaving has become something of a lost art. When your young son comes to you and announces his intention to begin shaving, and you look closely at his face to determine if any of that sprouting peach fuzz might need a trim, don't panic. Boys typically begin to grow facial hair at puberty between the ages of 12 and 15 when their bodies show signs of maturing into adulthood. They begin to grow facial and body hair, their voices deepen and their body height and weight begin to show signs of stabilizing. Boys tend to reach this point at a later age then girls. The moment of truth is noticing your son's friends have mustaches or even beards. What to do next? What advice can be given for that old lost art of shaving to make it a pleasure and not a form of torture? Luckily, methods of shaving haveadvanced. No longer do men use two seashells to scrape and pull the hairs like the cavemen did, nor do we use the sharpened flint or the copper, bronze, iron and volcanic glass razors of the past. Times have changed, and the tools of the trade have improved. Inventors have used different materials and designs to make razors that remain sharper and easier to use.

In 1847 William Henson came up with the razor design we recognize today the blade attached crosswise to a handle fashioned after a hoe. Shortly after, the Kampfe Brothers developed the guard along the blade called the "safety razor." Other recognizable shaving names are Norelco, King Camp Gillette (famed for the disposable razor) and Jacob Schick. Schick, a military man, used his familiarity with repeating rifles to develop the injector razor and the first electric razor, using the concept of rapidly moving blades. Over the years, innovative inventors have changed the way men shave and the products they use.