Presenting a collection of ephemera celebrating the life and legacy of Madame C.J. Walker
This collection originated with the Madame C.J. Walker Manufacturing Company which was incorporated in 1911, here in Indianapolis. All the documents are considered business related records.
FYI regarding the name or word Madame, sometimes she spelled it without the "e" and other times with the "e".
When Madame incorporated the business in 1911 she owned all 1000 shares of the company. Upon her passing, as dictated by her will and codicil, 2/3rds of the stock of the company were placed in a Trust over which were 5 Trustees. The other 1/3rd of the shares were bequeathed to Madame's only biological child, her daughter Lelia. Lelia "adopted" a daughter named Mae, and upon Lelia's passing (Lelia added an A to her name to become A'Lelia) she passed down her 1/3rd share to Mae Robinson.
The 2/3rds remained in Trust with the Trustees. Mae bequeathed her 1/3rd shares to her daughter whom she had named A'Lelia.
A'Lelia -Mae's daughter- married a man named Henry Bundles with whom she had three children, 2 boys and one girl whom she also named A'Lelia! Both A'Lelia's, Mae, and Madame's daughter A'Lelia were all also Trustees at some point.
My father Raymond L. Randolph worked with Mr. Henry Bundles at Summit labs; he was Mr. Bundles' top salesman of hair care products. They later partnered to establish a few business ventures together.
Raymond Randolph began working with a man named Henry Myers and with his backing, Raymond Randolph founded Elasta Products which was very successful. Around this time, the Trustees and the Bundle Family decided to sell the Madame C.J. Walker Manufacturing company. The year was 1985.
Due to their relationship and the success of Elasta Products, Henry Bundles reached out to my Father, Raymond Randolph, to ask him if he'd be interested in purchasing the company.
My Father accepted the offer and with his Brother Jeffery Randolph, they purchased all 1000 shares of stock in Madame's Company; the Trustees and the Bundles Family signed over their shares. My Father then (within a week or so) made a deal with his brother Jeff so that he, Raymond, would own all 1000 shares. Jeff sold his rights to the shares in exchange for some real estate property that he and my father had acquired. Jeff then became the sole owner of the real estate and my Father, Raymond became the sole owner of the original 1000 shares of Madame Walker's Manufacturing Company.
My father therefore was the first person since Madame herself to own all 1000 shares in the MCJW Mfg. Co. He was given the key to the old Stutz building downtown which is where the Trustees had move the entire MCJW Mfg. operation. The administrative side of the business still operated at the MCJW Theatre building but all historical files and memorabilia were in the basement of the old Stutz. Prior to selling the company to my Father, the Trustees had deposited a large amount of the business records of the company with the Indiana Historical Society; however it was on deposit, and not purchased by them, so Raymond Randolph owned those documents as well. (After the passing of Raymond Randolph in 2002, I formally donated (meaning by contract) that portion of the MCJW collection to the Indiana Historical Society. Retrieval of that collection would have required that we pay the storage fees that had accrued since 1985 and we were already struggling to keep the historical records that were in our possession safe and in good condition.)
The documents and memorabilia that are for auction are a small remnant of the documents that were within the many file cabinets my father acquired as the owner of the MCJW Mfg. Co. Every year we would literally discover new documents within the file cabinets. Many many letters similar to the one you have, were intermingled away within the business records because they actually are in fact business records. The Scurlock picture had become the iconic picture that would be used in almost every marketing campaign.
Even prior to his 2002 passing Raymond L. Randolph had placed the business in my name and had sold (for $1) the aforementioned archives to me, Vivian L. Randolph, with all Right of Publicity, copyrights etc. AND the stock shares. We held on to the company and rebuilt the brand but in 2013 we decided to sell the lion's share of the historical documents in our possession to the Indiana Historical Society to finally make the collection "whole". We also sold the hair care aspect of the trademark of MCJW to Sundial products but we kept all book rights and business records -most of which as mentioned were already sold to the Indiana Historical Society.
Click here to view a documentary on Madam CJ Walker written and narrated by Vivian Randolph.