Movember: Mustaches in McLean County History

Many of you may be familiar with Movember. During the month of November, men are encouraged to grow their facial hair (mustaches and otherwise), hence the name-a portmanteau of mustache and November. The Movember Foundation started the wildly popular trend in an attempt to "change the face" of men's health by encouraging early cancer detection and treatment. In observance of Movember, Museum staff thought it would be fun to highlight some historic 'staches of McLean County. I could not pass up the opportunity to spend time digging through the archives looking for mustaches. Here are some that were contributed by staff members and others that were stumbled upon deep in the folders of our museum archives!Joseph Irvin, D. E. Denman, and John F. Carlock.These photographs come from one of our larger archival collections, the Carlock/Irvin/Denman/Porter Collection, which follows four generations of a McLean County family through correspondence. Pictured here is Joseph Irvin (1825-1892, left), whose grandson would eventually marry D. E. Denman's daughter (Denman is seen in the middle). D.E. Denman's brother-in-law, John F. Carlock (1846 - 1916), founder of Carlock, Illinois, is on the right.