The Times from Shreveport, Louisiana • Page 41

T- Nemesis of the "Beauty Doctors" lp ro Dafe SHOES me lango of Patent Leather, Bronz Here They Are, Kid, Brocade Buckles and Some Without The Lates1 and Satin, Some witf with the Ribbon Lace Slip and Come Down. Word Is the Strapped Shoe (or theTang Doing Away Which So Often THOES that would a-tangoinu go must needs be beautifu I in the ballrooms of to-day. For the newest steps rA veal the whole foot, and the slit skirt lays bare thn ankle. So the dancer must take counsel of the thoenuketf who has thought long and deeply on the important subject! 1 I 1 I I -1 1 1 1 I ror lat ana u. mumpns 01 wnoee an iit-re uisiuayeu.

First he evolved thelango shoe, whose lengths oi ribbo' laces reached half way to the knee. But the end was not ye come. The ribbons, tied too tight, made tbe leet swell an ache. Tied too loose, they fell and cluttered around th, dancer's feet, not only to her discomfort, but that of he) partner. Suited for the measures of the waltz or minjefj they failed to meet the requirements of the more vigorouX tango, so the artist in shoes must again set to work.

1 A slipper was required which would cling to the fooy however lively the dancer or fast the dunce. It must grip thj heel and leave the ankle free, and its ornament must no hinder the grace of movement. So the shoemaker stuck his difficult task, and success has finally crowned his effort lie lias nun piuuut-cu nits vi uea-ciir txt atiyyvr, wun eaves free the ankle and also the instep. Two straps kee I 1 the foot, held in place by the fastened on ladies' walking gloves. And the nami "le minaret." made? Why, of what you will.

You n- to your dancing frock. The most smartl, The dancing slipper in its Kirr5" vtt brocade or cloth of gold, or bronzes anti covering for their feet. And a corn) has also been evolved something inten a boot and a slipper. It has a brocadl leather vamp; it is smart and stylist, and the dance floor. 1 est perfected form note the light straps which keep it snugly on the foot and yet give freedom to the ankle.

This example is of black brocade, delicately embossed in silver, with patent leather vamp and ornaments of tiny nailheads of steel, hammered together. Nemesis of "the face it snugly fitted to thich are familiar of this creation is Of what is it uit your shoe top a smart boot with pper of gold and RfcVVL rt ssed women wear ite kid may supply bination shoe mediate between top and patent 'hp street A dainty dancing shoe of black, silver and gold bro-cade. Colonial shape, with small tongue and buckle of bronrc-cut- steel. They Flit from Place to Place, Change Their Names Frequently or Hire Others to Do Their Ghastly Work "-But a Nemesis Is Always on Their Trail in the Per-son of Mrs. Frances Benze- cry, the Medical Society's "Beauty" Sleuth.

By Izolt Forrester. IllAVtJ been looking over the court records of cases agalust so-called "beauty doctors" tit thm Medical Society of New York Comity. They disclose facts concerning the most cruel aud nefarious practice that human beings bave supported through mistaken sense of vanity. Tbe islanders of the Paciflo carve and slush tueiusulves in accordance it lt old tribal la as. In darkest Africa explorers have fouud horrible sacrificial rites, which loft human beings scarred for life, ibut it remains for civilization to produce tut) "beauty doctor," the fake dermatologist, who persuades his patleuta or victims that he can carve or blister their faces into symmetry and loveliness.

On these records can be found pitiful cues. In many ways the present laws deal with the convicted parties inadequately. Prosecution rests upon the victim's nuikiug a complaint to the Medical Society, whereupon the case If Investigated. But in many instances the victim is ashamed to give her or his own name, and the society must procure its own evidence through private investigators. The best known of these is Mrs.

Frances Benzecry, who has represented tbe society for nine years, and secured more convictions through ber testimony than any other person. 1 had the privilege of meeting Mrs. Ben-tecry and going with her to visit several of the best known "parlors." Before we started, Mr. John Q. representing Mr.

Almuth Van diver, legal counsel of the society, described to me some of the society's case's. ''We have many complaints," he said, ''and have secured about twenty convictions during the past year, but the trouble is, the courts merely impose a fine, exacting a promise from the defendants to go out of business. In most cases we find they start up in a new place, after assuming a different- name, though sometimes they do not even take tbe trouble to do this. 'Take the case or the John H. Woodbury Co.

We secured their conviction three weeks ago. The court record is there on the desk. They advertised a special process called Derma Desquamation. We had several complaints about it, but you understand that we prosecute these people for the actual damage which they do. The charge must be practising medicine without a Ucen.se.

Mr. Benzecry went UP to their of fices, representing herself as a person desiring treatment, and getting their terms. They were willing to undertake the rebuilding of a which means, perhaps, cutting the eyelids underneath to remove the drooping muscles, injecting oil, paraffin, or other things into the facial wrinkles, removing birthmarks and scars, and inserting dimples. These are the most customary operations, besides skinning the face or peeling it to produce a new, unblem ished complexion, and treating the calp tor gray bair or baldness. "We had one poor girl write to us after she had been treated for the removal of a small on her cheek.

She was to have been married, and ber fiance objected to the blemish, ghe was a working girl, but had saved enough to go to a "beauty who assured her he could remove the mark without Injury. After the operation, her face failed to heal, and. (he side operated on became swollen and in- flamed. Tbe girl had literally a double face when she came to us. There is danger of cancer now, 1 am told, but the 'doctor1 had managed te secure a license permitting him to practise medicine.

80 iar he has escaped conviction, alleging that he acted la good faith. 'One of the enlef dangers lies in the fact that these people use but few anti septic precautions in their work. Hence I I I LI 4 tne aanger irora lniecuon aim uiuuu- poisoning. "Another case was that of a wemsa who had had her talp trea.ti came a here with half of her hair Iwhlte and half of it purple. The 'spec ialist' disappeared after the ease was finished, but is probably working the fame either here or In another with rhinestone buckle, and ornament.

i 5 Ir i I street or ballroom. 1 I. I Ml I I 4. a patent leather vamp anc an black brocade, which is suited der puffs be abolished and face powdei be applied with wads of cotton which shall be thrown away after once using. He would have all cutting instrumentsscissors, raiors, washed In a 1 per cent, solution of carbonate ot soda, wiped with dry linen and passed through a flame before being used 'All combs and sharing bruahei should bo kept in an airtight closet containing a reservoir ot a 40 per cent, solution of formol, should be dipped into boiling water before using and washed every evening in ammonia soap.

Dr. Fouquet would forbid barbers to strop razors on the palm of theli hands, lie would also Insist upon Individual utensils of all sorts for eac ractomer who has any contagious disease. Mrs. Frances Benzecry, who is city, under a new name." Frances Benzecry la not a formidable looking person by any means. She is a blue-eyed, resolute young woman, about five feet three and a half In height, and weighs perhaps a hundred and twenty pounds.

Her own complex ion is clear and rosy. There is a deep dimple In her chin. Her hair is black aud abundant, yet when she goes to the 'beauty doctors' they offer to carve and peel her into a belle. We met at 10.110 one Saturday morn ing. After many appearances in court.

Mrs. Benzecry is known by sight to most of the so-called practitioners. One Indignant lady, after her conviction, announced that she would keep a handy bottle of vitriol pn her mantelpiece ready to throw at the girl with the black hair and blue eyes if she ever came to her "parlor" again. Another "doctor" also threatened to 'get even." Mrs. Benzecry had gone to his offices several times, and had se cured his conviction on each charge.

After being lined, he invariably started up in a new locality, and practically defied the society to "get" him, because, he said, he would recogntz4 their investigator Uyer wanted me to try again," said Mrs. Benzecry, "so I dressed up one morning, rouged and touched up my eyelids and lips, dressed like a show girl, and went down for beauty treatments. He never recognized me at all. I sat up in the chair in his office while he went over my face, and told me what needed to be done, and how much it would cost me. The next morning in court I kept In tbe background.

He stated that he was not practising and received no patients at all. Then I stepped forward, and he got a good look at roe. 'I offered to treat that girl be told his lawyer. 'It's all Then he pleaded guilty and was opce more convicted. The sign was still on the building where their offices had been, but the negro porter told me they had moved across the street.

Here I found no name on the building directory, but the elevator starter directed me to one of the upper floors. Mrs. Benzecry waited downstairs. There, were three hare little offices with one stenographer and a manager as the working staff. No name appeared on the outer doors.

I assured the manager I did not wish any personal treatment, but my aunt, a well-to-do widow, was with me at a hotel and desired to have her face rebuilt. I added that she rather dreaded trusting herself to beauty specialists. ''My dear young woman," he protest ad kindly, "we are not beauty specialists. We ere dermatologists. We specialize on Derma Desquamation and have our own secret harmless process." He asked if I would like to consult with their surgeon, who had betn with them since the '80's.

I happened to know from Mrs. Benzecry that their old sureeon had definitely retired from practising with them slnr-a the last conviction, but 1 followed him down two doers to another While I waited alone In the reception room I looked at the circulars lying on the desk. They stated that the doctor had been chief for John H. Woodbury for many years, and had made a specialty of "Face Culture." I had to wait for so.ne time, white tbe surgeon was closeted in an inner office with two patients, who wanted their eyelids operated on that afternoon. He told them ha could cut the under eyelid, draw up the puffing, sagging flesb, cut away the superfluous fold and sew up what was left so that it would leave no scar.

The price would be 1 100. One society woman, he added, had engaged him to rebuild her face at a cost of several hundred dollars. During the period she gave out a report to the newspapers that she had been In an automobile accident. Now she lived in Paris, aud. although over fifty, was about to contract a mar riage with a young man of twenty-live.

The argument appeared satisfactory to the other two women patients, and they agreed to be operated on within a few days. My turn came next. The outer office was a small window-less affair, cramped and dusty. Tucked1 into a bookcase with many pamphlets was a rolled up surgeon's gown and several surgical outfits. The inner office was untidy and generally unsanitary.

So far as I could see there was no attempt at antiseptic precautions or clean conditions. The "surgeon," as he called himself, was smooth faced and smiling. He listened to my account with Interest, meantime Jotting down a list of prices on a tablet. The first was for "lifting the sag." This operation, he explained, consisted of slitting the skin under the hair above the ears, and drawing up the loose, flabby muscles of the cheeks. For blotting out wrinkles all over the face the charge was another $250, and lastly $300 was the fee for taking out the deep wrinkles between the eyebrows and on the forehead.

I asked why go much was charged for such a minor operation. "We use our secret preparation for this," he explained. "It is an original protoplasmic fluid which rebuilds the dead tissues." At one beauty parlor Mrs. Benzecry went up with, me. There had been no conviction, only complaints here.

We waited for some time in the large pink and gold reception room, until the woman proprietor could see us. She was very tactful and pleasant when naked about the removal of freckles. "Lotions rarely remove them except for a time," she saW. "Now by my special process I kill that dark pigment so that it never returns Three appli cations in ten days, and I guarantee a perfect skin for twenty-flve years. It is all a question of pigment, I remove the skin, peel it off entirely.

The cost 1st lifty dollars. I used to charge one hundred, but am going out of business." Mrs. Benzecry asked It she intended stopping her practice entirely. The woman smiled. "I may taks private patients at my hotel later on," she said.

"All women desire to be beautiful, you know." I showed her a birthmark on my arm which the Woodbury doctor bad agreed to remove painlessly, replacing it with his protoplasmic skin. But this woman preferred killing the dark pigment by her tecret process whicn would cost me $100. Her prices on birthmarks went tip to $700, on smallpox marks up to $2,000. Ordinary beauty treatments ranged from $100 to $300. "It Is a ghastly business," Mr.

Dyer 7 The high tango boot of white kid with the modified ribbon lacing. This gives the added se curity of the laces without the danger of their loosening and falling down. Another high tango boot with buttoned straps. It is of bronze kid. delicately beaded.

said, after my round of visits with Mrs. Benzecry. "You can tee how these people trade on the credulity and vanity of human beings. There is a bill coming up bafore the Legislature against the soalled 'nature We need stronger laws and heavier penalties also to settle the 'beauty doctor', and stop the preying on unfor-tuuate victims. The public does not reallise the lengths to 'hlch this illegal operating on laces, heads, and so on, has been carried.

The people who suffer lose their chance for sympathy in a measure through their foolish credulity and their ignorance of consequences, hut that doei not leave the practitioner Immune fro.n blame. While his prices are to some extent prohibitory so far as the poor are concerned, they reach out tbelr lures to all classes. An elaborate tango sandal of gold, red and black brocade, laced with black satin ribbon. process. Imagine a peeled face, slit swollen eyelids, plastered nose, and sewed-up cheeks.

Yet the procession of willing patients keeps right on Oiling the reception rooms, and encourages the fake doctor to pay his fine and spring up again in a new spot. PROVISIONS FOR ASEPTIC BARBER1NG IN PARIS THE rarls Board ot lleaitn is anoui to take up the problem of compelling barbers to use sanitary methods. It will hsve before it the recommendations made by Dr. Fouquet to tne Societe de Prophylaxle. Dr.

Fouquet recommends thai lumps of aiam be abolished and that calcined alum In powder and applied with cotton batting be substituted as a styptic; that pow "I beard from Mrs. Benzecry recently of one parlor uptown making a special ty of operations on the eyelids, remov ing the slant from Chinese and Japa-1 ete patlunts, and putting In the slant for society women and actresses who wts-hed to effect the latest Oriental fashion in eyei." Vanity is Inborn in all human creatures. Tbe Patagonlaa belle will slit her nosn or upper Hp. and csrvs her cheoks with ornamental designs. Girls in some countries uSr torture to be tattooed for benny's sake, and in another land they allow thorns to be run through the cheeks and ears because this style of ornamentation appeals to the aesthetic sense of the natives.

But If you ever want to look at a real of beauty's doctoring, try a patient fresh from the face building 1..