It seems to me that full beards were pretty much out of style in the World War II era. Even mustaches seem pretty damn rare (I know, except for THAT guy). Were there any notable people of the time - important political. cultural or military figures - who wore full beards? Link to a picture if you have one.
Don’t be a wiseass and link to a bunch of pictures of rabbis. I’ll exclude rabbis or anyone else who had to wear a beard for religious reasons.
Charlie Chaplin had some facial hair
We tackled this once before. The thread listed a number of people who wore beards during the era (Ernest Hemmingway, Burl Ives, Orson Wells), but according to wikipedia:
Igor Kurchatov, the head of the Soviet atomic bomb program had one heckuva beard. However, I’ve also seen pictures of him where he’s clean shaven so I don’t know if he had the beard during the war or grew it later.
Several u-boat commanders had beards. This website lists the commanders with pictures. If you go through, you’ll see about a quarter of them were bearded. (Interestingly, virtually all the rest were clean-shaven. I only came across one who had a moustache without a beard.)
Most u-boat crewmen grew them while on patrol-some, but not all, shaved them off when back in port. The US Navy allowed beards back then too.
American GIs were also known to grow beards when out in the field for weeks if not months on end, as memorialized by cartoonist Bill Mauldin: http://warrelics.eu/forum/military_photos/docs-paper-items-photos-propaganda/99766d1272139323-new-us-44-cent-stamp-wonderful-tribute-willie-joe44stamp.jpg
A famous photo of U.S. soldiers getting their first hot meal in weeks; shaving was not a priority: http://home.scarlet.be/~tsc94696/images/gavin/gavin9.jpg
Meet Orde Wingate, who’s probably most famous in Israel for his Christian Zionism and training of the Haganah, but who was a British General in World War II, and created the Chindits, British and Gurhka troops in the Army of India who fought behind Japanese lines in Burma.
Of course, he was probably insane.
“Doc” of Cannery Row fame was noted for having a beard.
King Haile Selassie of Ethiopia had a beard.
Moustaches were common in the 1940s, particularly on British and Commonwealth officers. The “RAF moustache” was a meme at the time.
Beards were rare, moustaches were common.
The very first ordinary person I ever saw with a beard was a grad student at Columbia in 1962 and I was astonished. Actually, I saw him a week ago and he still had it. I had a mustache for a while in 1960 or so. Then I shaved it. Mustaches were not common but not unknown in the 50s. Then in the early 60s (a bit before the beatnik era, actually) a few academics allowed their beards to grow. In 1964, I met someone who shaved every weekend, head and face, with a razor set to about 1/4 inch. Over Christmas vacation, 1964-65 I stopped shaving and have never shaved since. But for the first year or so when I walked down the street of the small town in southern NJ where my wife was from, I got stared at incessantly. By the late 60s it was no longer so uncommon.
Here’s a story from last October in the “Wall Street Journal” about the lack of facial hair on politicians the last 100 years.
I don’t have a cite but my understanding is beards because a fashion statement in the mid19th century because of the Crimean war. British soldiers were allowed to grow beards for warmth and when they returned home, it started a fashion trend.
Speaking of fashion trends, I always associated the popularity of long hair and facial hair with the Beatles around the “Sgt Pepper” album. A few oddball beatnik freaks before that but the Beatles were pretty conventional before “Sgt Pepper”. A bit longer than normal and believe it or not, the “moptop” look got ridicule circa “I want to Hold Your Hand”. I have never read anything about why the Fab Four started to grow hair. Anybody know?
The moptop look came directly from their friends in Hamburg, German “existentialist” students, particularly Astrid Kirchherr. Before that, the Beatles had rocker quiffs, Elvis-style, which was also longer-than-average at the time.
the entire iranian army.
Full beards - which are often associated with more orthodox Islam - became much more popular after the 1979 revolution.
No. Iranians always have been known for beards; independent of Islam; orthodox or not.
