Challenge: seven years old—parents dead, no roof but the next one’s, no school after eighth grade, scalp on fire from the cheap combs white folks sold Black women.
Accountable: didn’t curse the world. Mixed the first batch in her kitchen sink, tested it on her own head, sold it door-to-door. Every jar that failed was hers to fix.
Assimilated: invented Poro—hair care, yes, but really a school. Turned customers into owners. Gave Black women their own storefronts, their own paychecks.
Allegiance: gave millions to the Black YMCA, to orphans, to Howard—said “if I rise, we rise.”
Permanent: the work never stopped. Kitchen table to boardroom—same hands.
Prudent: pennies in a jar, no waste, every dollar reinvested.
Pragmatic: built slow, built solid, let the women run their own branches.
Lemons: orphan, broke, no recipe.
What she made: Poro empire—hair products, yes, but really dignity in a jar.
Read: On Her Own Ground by A’Lelia Bundles—walks like a story.
Grateful Immigrant 