Beard Liberation Front
18th December
Anger at attempts to claim Scrooge had a beard
The Beard Liberation Front, the informal network of beard wearers, has said that some supporters have expressed anger at attempts to claim that Scrooge, the central figure in Charles Dickens Christmas Carol had a beard.
One notable example is on a pump clip for Mr Scrooge a seasonal beer from Stockport brewer Robinsons. The clip has a drawing of Scrooge with a top hat and a beard, perhaps like a Victorian mill owner, rather than the City of London accountant he actually was.
Dickens described Scrooge’s appearance thus:
The cold within him froze his old features, nipped his pointed nose, shrivelled his cheek, stiffened his gait, made his eyes red, his thin lips blue..a frosty rime was on his head, and on his eyebrow and his wiry chin
Scrooge’s City of London firm, off Cornhill in the centre of the Capital’s financial district, was certainly not a centre for beard wearing in the 1840s and hirsuteness is not seen a great deal even in 2021.
BLF Organiser Keith Flett said, attempts to portray Scrooge with a beard, are simply a reflection of a dislike or fear of facial hair, pogonophobia. The beer is decent by the way.
This may sound bizarre but I’m thinking more about the history of shaving. Was there a point in history where the trend was established, and for what reasons?