Hairstyling and Homemaking: The Career of Velma Truant

August 20, 2024

In 2023, The Henry Ford acquired a remarkable collection — a hair dryer and salon chair, in fabulous mid-century pink and chrome, as well as the tools, pins, rollers, and documents that hairstylist Velma Truant had collected over her nearly forty-year career. The collection serves as detailed documentation of Velma’s career, balanced with her home life as a wife and mother.

Velma Truant at the Illinois state line during her honeymoon, about 1950 / THF712578

Velma was born in Hungary to Steven and Suzannah Toth, on Christmas Day 1928. Shortly after Velma’s birth, the family immigrated to the United States, settling in Detroit’s Delray neighborhood — an area popular with Hungarian and other Eastern European immigrants who had come to Detroit looking for opportunity and well-paying jobs. Steven worked as a musician in a Hungarian band until his death when Velma was eleven, while Suzannah worked in the kitchen at the Book Cadillac hotel — a job that allowed her to bring home extra food to sustain her family during the Great Depression. Beginning at age fourteen, and while still attending school, Velma worked a series of jobs, including at a candy store and a funeral home.

After graduating from Southwestern High School in 1946, Velma initially began taking engineering and design classes at Wayne State University. She changed her plans, however, and decided to enroll at the Del-Mar Beauty School in Detroit to begin training to become a hairstylist. By February 1948, twenty year old Velma was styling hair at the J. L. Hudson department store (commonly known as Hudson’s) in downtown Detroit. In 1950, Velma married Aldo Truant, the son of Italian immigrants. The couple first lived with Aldo’s parents in the Oakwood Heights neighborhood of Detroit, before building their own home in Allen Park. Even after marriage, Velma continued to work at Hudson’s, as she enjoyed earning her own money.

The Del-Mar Beauty School, Inc. Diploma Awarded to Velma Ella Toth, 1947 / THF714037

By the time Velma worked there in the early 1950s, Hudson's was the second-largest department store in the country — second only to Macy’s — and the tallest store in the world with thrity-two floors. The downtown building housed 200 departments on forty-nine acres of shopping floor space, employed 12,000 people, and averaged 100,000 customers per day. At its peak in the late 1940s through the early 1960s, it offered a circulating library, a writing lounge, dry cleaning, shoeshine, travel services, typing lessons, interior design consultation, home advice, hat cleaning, and jewelry repair. Its beauty salon had existed since at least the 1920s, and in 1947 was updated to include 17,000 square feet and 160 employees, offering facials, complexion consultation, makeup services, and permanent wave machines, in addition to traditional hairstyling. Velma would have been busy, as she worked in an era when many women made frequent trips to the beauty parlor.

Velma Truant (front row, far left) and other Hudson’s hairstylists, 1962 / THF712587

While working at Hudson’s, Velma frequently traveled to New York City to receive training at the American Hair Design Institute, where they taught new techniques and the latest fashions. Velma loved these trips, and was often joined by Aldo. On one notable trip to New York, Velma was asked to work with Lucille Ball; as a natural strawberry blonde, Velma understood how to work with red hair. Velma took great pride in her work. While she liked the glamour and social aspect of the salon, she herself was never too “into the beauty thing,” as her daughter recalled. She always had immaculate nails and dressed meticulously, but never used much makeup.

Velma Truant working on mannequin hair in New York / THF712584

In August 1963, Aldo and Velma — who had struggled for years to conceive a child — adopted a baby girl, whom they named Cynthia after Velma’s boss at Hudson’s. That same year, Velma made the choice to leave Hudson’s to devote more time to caring for her daughter. She did, however, continue to take clients in her home salon, set up in her basement laundry room. Once Cynthia settled into elementary school in 1970, Velma returned to work with Hudson’s, transferring to the Southland branch in July. In December, she was promoted to manager. The promotion, however, changed the way Velma felt about her work, and she retired from Hudson’s in 1972.

Hair dryer and salon chair from Velma Truant’s in-home salon, likely acquired when Hudson’s updated their Northland location in 1960s / THF370815, THF370816

During her brief return to Hudson’s, Velma continued seeing clients in her home. She worked from her basement salon throughout Cynthia’s school years, only fully retiring from hairstyling in 1981.

While the artifacts themselves document Velma Truant’s work as a hairstylist, the reminiscences provided by her family further tell a story about who she was as a person. Her daughter, Cynthia, recalls that Velma was “always immaculate,” both in her personal attire and in the presentation of her home — even going so far as to keep a stock of green toilet paper to match her salmon-and-green basement bathroom. Velma and Aldo would often dress in matching colors, and remained close until his death in 2018, after 67 years of marriage. Velma herself would pass away in November 2021, leaving behind a legacy as not just a talented hairstylist, but a devoted wife and mother.

Velma and Aldo Truant at Portofino’s restaurant, Wyandotte, Michigan, July 2009 / THF712591

Rachel Yerke-Osgood is an associate curator at The Henry Ford.