Merle Norman (1887-1972) launched her cosmetics empire mere steps away from here. Born Merle Mozelle Nethercutt in Logansport, IN, she first made headlines in 1903 when she accused a vaudeville magician of kidnapping her, hypnotizing her, and injecting her with cocaine. (The magician, one “Claude Laverty”, was convicted of abduction but his name vanished from newspapers after he was granted a retrial – journalists had probably misidentified him.) She was a South Bend schoolteacher when she married Andrew Norman Gullickstad in 1913; his middle name became their new surname around the time they moved to Ocean Park with Merle’s parents, c. 1920. They settled on 2523 3rd Street. Merle’s work as an embalmer led to a desire to develop her own makeup line and on June 20th, 1929, an ad for “Merle Norman’s powder base”, sold out of her house, appeared in the L.A. Times. Six years later, Merle Norman Cosmetics was so popular that its proprietress could construct a large Art Deco plant on Main Street; the former Sand Street was renamed Norman Place around that time. There’s a lot more to the story of Merle Norman – the woman and the company – but I will close by noting that in 1958, Merle’s nephew J.B. Nethercutt (1913-2004), who eventually controlled the firm (Merle had no kids), built a new plant in Sylmar. It’s now home to the Nethercutt Museum and Collection, an extravagant display of classic cars and antiques.
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