Print edition: 
One of the fun parts of this job is talking to groups around town. These groups range from second-graders to fraternity guys to civic organizations to countless women's groups.
But when a member of a local P.E.O. chapter called and asked me to talk to her group, it was a first. No, I've talked to other P.E.O. chapters, but this time the topic they wanted me to address was very specific: The History of Lipstick.
"Would that be all right?" the caller asked.
"Sure, that will be fun," I said, slightly puzzled. Usually it's seasonal fashion, but heck, I can research with the best of them.
And since I had such fun finding out about lipstick and telling the P.E.O. ladies about it, I thought I should share the information with my dear readers. Don't stop reading — there will be a test.
The first coloring of the lips is traced to 60 B.C. and the coloring was probably made of crushed semiprecious stones. Hope they were able to crush them really, really fine. Let's see. Ruby ring or lipstick? I'd take the ring.
Cleopatra may or may not have looked like Elizabeth Taylor, but we do have the ancient recipe for her lipstick: Take carmine beetles and grind them up. Mix the strong red pigment and add ant's eggs. Fold in a bit of henna and, for shimmer, fish scales.
Whew. Move over, Elizabeth Arden. Wonder what it smelled like? Wonder what it tasted like?
As bad as that sounds, it was better than the bromine and iodine used in years later. The combination of ingredients caused disease. It was poison, for Pete's sake.
Then there was Queen Elizabeth, she of the pasty white face who had a penchant for deep red lipstick. Her lip concoction was made of beeswax, berries and plants.
Another queen, Victoria, to be exact, thought that reddening one's lips was impolite. Parliament passed a law in 1770 stating that any woman who seduced a man into marriage "by means of makeup" could be tried as a witch. Or so I've read.
In America by 1880, lipstick was being worn, but only by women who were fast and loose, according to the research.
Makeup companies today owe a great deal to the flappers of the Roaring 1920s. These gals threw out their corsets, bobbed their hair and made sure their lips were red.
To their rescue came Elizabeth Arden, who helped make cosmetics accessible to women. Hollywood stars also were great promoters of lipstick, even though their lips sometimes looked black in films.
By now you might be wondering what ingredients are in lipstick these days.
From what I've read, it's a combination of wax, cocoa butter, petrolatum (soft paraffin), lanolin, olive, mineral and castor oil, and moisturizers such as vitamin E, aloe vera, amino acids, sunscreens and collagen, as well as various dyes and pigments.
Think how impressed those women who crushed semiprecious stones would be today with the plethora of lipsticks, lip plumpers, glosses, primers, liners and lip stains we have available to us.
