Ahhh-- memories of 1960s Halloween. Those lurid orange black, and green-printed cardboard hanging decorations*, the packets of stickers, the liquid latex only available in green, the Ben Cooper official Halloween costumes with their stiff plastic masks and flimsy bodysuits. And the blister-pack makeup, consisting of two sticks of greasepaint and a shallow tin in a third color.
They sold that at a lot of the local stores. You could get Clown (mostly white in the tin, with red and blue sticks, or Princess (pancake in the tin, with red and another color), but the others seem pretty racist to modern eyes. Gypsy/Pirate edges into the pale, but Indian and Chinese and especially Minstrel are definitely over the line. I found this picture of the stuff on Ebay. Apparently it was “Masquerade Makeup”, and some sources say it was from Ben Cooper, although I haven’t verified that:
https://search.yahoo.com/search;_ylt=A0LEV0e8elNUe2cA9f5XNyoA;_ylc=X1MDMjc2NjY3OQRfcgMyBGZyA3lmcC10LTkwMQRncHJpZANkbFVGcmw3bFJCYUY5dVNxVm9nVDdBBG5fcnNsdAMwBG5fc3VnZwMwBG9yaWdpbgNzZWFyY2gueWFob28uY29tBHBvcwMwBHBxc3RyAwRwcXN0cmwDBHFzdHJsAzQyBHF1ZXJ5AzE5NjBzIHJhY2lzdCBIYWxsb3dlZW4gIk1hc3F1ZXJhZGUiIG1ha2V1cAR0X3N0bXADMTQxNDc1NzUzNA--?p=1960s+racist+Halloween+"Masquerade"+makeup&fr2=sb-top-search&fr=yfp-t-901&fp=1
http://antique-vintagetoys.com/?s=racist-toy-vintage
Here are a few of the non-racist ones, like Blue Brute and Purple People Eater:
http://www.halloweencollectible.com/prop/makeup-kit.html
*which still seem to be around, if you look. Like the pumpkin on the door of the witch woman in that Kit Kat ad that’s been running forever, featuring the witch woman giving out her no doubt arsenic-laced candy to those ostentatiously well-behaved kids.
I never had those when I was a kid. My costumes came out of boxes, and had vacuum-formed masks similar to these. I remember two of them: One was a tiger costume, which comprised orange-and-black tiger-striped pyjamas and a tiger mask; and the other was an astronaut. I don’t remember the clothing, but the mask had a light in the forehead that could be activated by pressing a strip of metal to a D-cell. (Not even a proper button!) I wore the tiger suit as PJs for a long time.
I didn’t notice the make-up kits as mentioned in the OP until I was an adult. I built my own make-up kit for Halloween parties and films. I had Ben Nye powder, and grease, make-up; a bottle of blood I mixed up; spider webs, which were good for my zombie make-up; a nice set of fangs (proper ones, not the plastic false teeth you get at a costume shop); sponge applicators; and various other things that could be used. When my friend suddenly closed his studio, my make-up kit got mixed up with the other equipment and I haven’t seen it since.
As a big fan of Famous Monsters, I bought the Dick Smith Monster Makeup Handbook (published bhy the same folks), and used to do elaborate makeup effects. Still do, in fact. But as a young kid, I used the boxed costumes with the pressed plastic masks.
Yeah, I went back and forth between the boxed costumes and ones my mother made - she was a very able seamstress and could turn out some great stuff with five minute’s effort.
The box ones I remember are an Adam West-era Batman, and a strange robot one with a round white nose. The latter was confusing, to 5- or 6-year-old me at least, because the mask seemed to have no determined up-down orientation.
Won the prizes with mom’s costumes, through, including the perennial “Once Was” (bum) and ghost in a derby hat. The frayed noose around the neck helped.