Annie Turnbo Malone  Annie Minerva Turnbo Malone (August 9, 1877 or 1869 – May 10, 1957) was an American businesswoman, inventor and philanthropist. She is thought to be one of the first African American women to become a millionaire. In the first three decades of the 20th century, she founded and developed a large and prominent commercial and educational enterprise centered on cosmetics for African-American women. Annie Minerva Turnbo was born in Metropolis, Illinois, the daughter of Robert and Isabella Turnbo, who may have been former slaves. When her father went off to fight for the Union with the 1st Kentucky Cavalry in the Civil War, Isabella took the couple's children and escaped from Kentucky, a neutral border state that maintained slavery. After traveling down the Ohio River, she found refuge in Metropolis, Illinois. Annie Turnbo was born on a farm near Metropolis in Massac County, Illinois. , the tenth of eleven children. Orphaned at a young age, she attended a public school in Metropolis, before moving in 1896 to live with her older sister Ada Moody in Peoria. There Turnbo attended high school, taking particular interest in chemistry. However, due to frequent illness, she was forced to withdraw from classes. While out of school, Turnbo grew so fascinated with hair and hair care that she often practiced hairdressing with her sister. With expertise in both chemistry and hair care, Turnbo began to develop her own hair-care products. At the time, many women used goose fat, heavy oils, soap, or bacon grease to straighten their curls, which damaged both scalp and hair. By the beginning of the 1900s, Turnbo moved with her older siblings to Lovejoy, now known as Brooklyn, Illinois. While experimenting with hair and different hair-care products, she developed and manufactured her own line of non-damaging hair straighteners, special oils, and hair-stimulant products for African-American women. She named her new product “Wonderful Hair Grower”. To promote her new product, Turnbo sold the Wonderful Hair Grower in bottles door-to-door. Her products and sales began to revolutionize hair-care methods for all African Americans. In 1902, Turnbo moved to a thriving St. Louis, where she and three hired assistants sold her hair-care products door-to-door. As part of her marketing, she gave away free treatments to attract more customers. Due to the high demand for her product in St. Louis, Turnbo opened her first shop in 1902 at 2223 Market Street.