The toothbrush moustache is a style of moustache in which the sides are vertical (or nearly so), often approximating the width of the nose and visually resembling the bristles on a toothbrush. First becoming popular in the United States in the late 19th century, it later spread to Germany and elsewhere. Comedians such as Charlie Chaplin and Oliver Hardy popularized it, reaching its heyday during the interwar years. By the end of World War II, the association with Nazi leader Adolf Hitler made it controversial, leading to it being colloquially termed the Hitler moustache or "Hitler Stash".
After World War II, toothbrush variants were fashioned by a small number of notable people, e.g. American real-estate developer Fred Trump (who sported a split variant) and former president of Zimbabwe Robert Mugabe (covering only the philtrum). Remaining strongly associated with Hitler over subsequent decades, the style was used satirically in works of popular culture and political imagery, including motion pictures, comic books, and 1970s-era rock and roll.
19th century–World War II In the United States The toothbrush originally became popular in the late 19th century, in the United States. It was a neat, uniform, low-maintenance moustache that echoed the standardization and uniformity brought on by industrialization, in contrast to the more flamboyant styles typical of the 19th century such as the imperial, walrus, handlebar, horseshoe, and pencil moustaches.
English comic actor Charlie Chaplin was one of the most famous wearers of the toothbrush style. Shortly after wearing a full moustache for his 1914 film debut (Making a Living for Southern California's Keystone Studios), he sported a prop toothbrush moustache for his first film as the Tramp, Mabel's Strange Predicament (though Kid Auto Races at Venice was the first released). After selecting a wardrobe, he added a moustache after recalling that producer Mack Sennett was expecting him to be older; Chaplin felt that the toothbrush had a comical appearance and was small enough not to hide his expression.Chaplin, Charles (1964). My Autobiography, p. 154. "I was undecided whether to look old or young, but remembering Sennett had expected me to be a much older man, I added a small mustache, which I reasoned, would add age without hiding my expression." Within a few years of the Tramp's debut, the look was being copied; by 1920, Chaplin allegedly entered and lost a Chaplin look-alike contest, having omitted his signature moustache. Chaplin incorporated the noted similarity between the Tramp and Nazi Party leader Adolf Hitler in his 1940 film The Great Dictator, playing both a Tramp-like Jewish barber and a parody of Hitler. This was Chaplin's final appearance with the moustache.
Prominent American animation producer Max Fleischer wore a toothbrush moustache . Comedian Oliver Hardy also adopted the moustache, using it at least as early as the 1921 film The Lucky Dog. American actor Fred Kelsey flaunted a toothbrush , while in the mid-1930s bit-part player Brooks Benedict thickened his mid-moustache, evoking the toothbrush style (flanked by pencil-thin sides). Although Groucho Marx wore a larger moustache, novelty Groucho glasses (sold ) often elicit the toothbrush. It has been occasionally claimed that American film producer Walt Disney donned a toothbrush, but his nose-width moustache lacked the characteristic steep sides. Frank Churchill, composer for a number of Disney films, sometimes styled one.
San Francisco mayor (and later California governor) James Rolph and Los Angeles mayor Frank L. Shaw sported toothbrushes in the 1920s and 1930s, as did Washington state governor Clarence D. Martin in the 1930s. American real-estate developer Fred Trump, the father of U.S. president Donald Trump, sported a variant (exposing his lower philtrum) as early as 1936, including in some apparent photomanipulations. The moustache appeared on some members of the German American Bund during a 1937 New York City parade. A number of associates of American condiment company Heinz were photographed wearing toothbrushes in 1940 (at a convention in Quebec). A split variant appears on a spoof of Hitler in Tex Avery's 1942 cartoon Blitz Wolf.
In Germany
The toothbrush moustache was introduced to Germany in the late 19th century by visiting Americans. Previously, the most popular style was the imperial moustache, also known as the "Kaiser moustache", which was perfumed and turned up at the ends, as worn by German emperor Wilhelm II. By 1907, enough Germans were wearing the toothbrush moustache to elicit notice by The New York Times under the headline "'TOOTHBRUSH' MUSTACHE; German Women Resent Its Usurpation of the [Kaiser moustache]". The toothbrush was taken up by German automobile racer and folk hero Hans Koeppen in the famous 1908 New York to Paris Race, cementing its popularity among young gentry. Koeppen was described as "Six-feet in height, slim, and athletic, with a toothbrush mustache characteristic of his class, he looks the ideal type of the young Prussian guardsman." By the end of World War I, even some of the German royals were sporting the toothbrush; Crown Prince Wilhelm can be seen with a toothbrush moustache in a 1918 photograph that shows him about to be sent into exile. It was also fashioned by German Social Democratic politician and two-time chancellor of Germany (1920, 1928–1930) Hermann Müller, as well as German serial killer Peter Kürten (1883–1931), who eventually reduced it to only the philtrum.
There are dubious claims that Adolf Hitler began wearing the toothbrush prior to the early 1920s (when it was first reliably documented). His sister-in-law, Bridget Hitler, tenuously claimed that he spent the winter of 1912–13 at her home in Liverpool, England, during which time the two quarrelled, mostly because she could not stand his Kaiser moustache; she reputedly persuaded him to cut it, resulting in him fashioning a toothbrush. A 1914 photograph by Heinrich Hoffmann purports to show Hitler with a toothbrush, but this was probably doctored to serve as Nazi propaganda. As evidenced by photographs, Hitler wore the Kaiser moustache as a soldier during WWI. Author Alexander Moritz Frey, who served as a medic in the same regiment as Hitler, claimed that the latter donned the toothbrush in the trenches after he was ordered to trim his moustache to facilitate the wearing of a gas mask; although Frey's story is unproven, Hitler indeed had a blinding encounter with poison gas during WWI—causing his hospitalization at the war's very end. Other sources claim Hitler wore it as early as 1919.
Hitler is generally thought to have incorporated the toothbrush as a trademark of his appearance during the early meetings of the Nazi Party (formed in 1920).An official document dated 1921 shows Hitler with a traditional moustache. A very early depiction of him with the toothbrush is a photograph from c. 1923. According to cultural historian Ron Rosenbaum, "there is no evidence (though some speculation)" that Hitler modelled his moustache on Charlie Chaplin's. In 1923, Hitler's future publicist Ernst Hanfstaengl advised Hitler to lose the toothbrush, to which he replied, "If it is not the fashion now, it will be later because I wear it." Hanfstaengl subsequently adopted the style. In 1932, Hitler wore the toothbrush narrower on bottom. In 1933 (the year Hitler became chancellor), the Nazis began to lambast Chaplin as "non-Aryan" in anti-Semitic propaganda, though Chaplin was not Jewish. According to Hitler's bodyguard Rochus Misch, Hitler "loved" Chaplin films, a number of which he watched at his teahouse near the Berghof (built ). By the height of World War II, Hitler's toothbrush moustache was such a defining feature of his appearance that it was assumed he would be unrecognizable without it and that he could use this logic to evade capture by the Allies. In her posthumous memoir, Hitler's secretary Christa Schroeder () claimed that Hitler said in the mid-1920s that the moustache offset his purportedly oversized nose. His nose was only notably engorged close to the end of WWII.
Politician Anton Drexler, a mentor of Hitler, wore a notched version of the toothbrush. Friedrich Kellner, a Social Democrat who campaigned against Hitler, also wore it. Various notable Nazis sported versions, including Heinrich Himmler, politician Karl Holz, military officer Ernst Röhm and Hitler's chauffeur Julius Schreck.
Near the end of WWII in Europe, on the same day Hitler committed suicide, a U.S. Army private who searched Hitler's Munich apartment found his top hat and used a comb to mimic the moustache in a Chaplin routine from The Great Dictator, to the laughter of his fellow soldiers (as recounted in a book of war stories). In the days after Hitler's death in Berlin, the Soviet Union produced footage of a supposed body double wearing the style—variously invoked in Soviet-bolstered claims that Hitler somehow escaped.
Other places Dutch painter Piet Mondrian wore a toothbrush c. 1922. English writer George Orwell wore the style during the 1920s before adapting his more iconic pencil moustache. The toothbrush is worn by the sidekick of English author Agatha Christie's fictional detective Hercule Poirot. German Jew and anti-Nazi activist Alfred Wiener wore a similar style while living in Amsterdam in the mid-1930s. Spanish general Francisco Franco (the dictator of Spain from 1939 to 1975) wore it throughout the 1930s. In a 1936 political cartoon, New Zealand artist David Low portrayed Soviet leader Joseph Stalin forging a toothbrush (along with a regular haircut) to mirror Hitler. On a 1941 poster, Russian artist Dmitry Moor depicted Hitler with a split toothbrush variant.
A Russian-born, Chaplin-influenced clown named Karandash ('the pencil') had a version of it. During World War II, Karandash entertained Soviet troops by mocking the Axis powers. Amongst other Soviet military displays, Commander Pavel Dybenko paired the style with his beard and Major General Hazi Aslanov wore a variant covering only the philtrum.File:Aslanov AA.jpg - Wikimedia Commons
Post–World War II
By the end of World War II, the toothbrush moustache had fallen out of fashion due to its strong association with Hitler, but it was still worn by the notable individuals Oliver Hardy and (until about 1950) Fred Trump. U.S. and Chile intelligence documented a number of Nazi émigrés with the style in South America in the decade after the war. It was donned by several politicians of Israel (formed as a state in 1948), some for much of their careers. Hitler's dentist, Hugo Blaschke (), wore a similar style, displaying an explicit toothbrush later in life. Armenian Soviet official Anastas Mikoyan upkept a similar style as late as 1962. French railway worker Jean-Marie Loret () donned a toothbrush to publicize his claim of being Hitler's son (since disproven).