Sometimes a ship’s captain at sea on deployment will allow his crew to go without shaving, usually with some kind of buy-in providing donations to the Morale, Welfare and Recreation fund. Not all captains do it, and the CNO slammed the door on it during my last deployment, making it clear—in no uncertain terms—that COs were not allowed to grant such blanket exceptions to Navy grooming standards. But it was fun for a while, and occasioned the following story, which is an example of a time the story and prayer weren’t directly connected. Sometimes a story is worth telling on its own. I hope you agree.
Jacob was cold. He’d been cold before, growing up in Iowa where every year in Winter Mother Nature makes a serious attempt to kill you, but that cold was nothing like this cold. At -40˚ it doesn’t matter anymore whether you use Fahrenheit or Celsius, you just know it’s cold. Yet he would rather be here than back in the Philippines where he’d served in the Army during the Spanish-American War. He’d contracted dysentery then, so after a long convalescence, deciding the tropics weren’t for him, he finished his Army career running communications cables into the Alaskan interior. Once he finished that, he decided to stick around to do some prospecting for gold in Alaska and British Columbia, partly because it was so beautiful there. But he had never been so cold.
For Jacob one of the worst things about the cold was that it made shaving difficult. To him the mark of a civilized man is a cleanly shaven face, but at -40˚ your spit will freeze before it hits the ground. Wet shaving just wasn’t possible. So Jacob designed an electric razor. It was big, bulky, and completely impractical, but improvements in the design would have to wait. The Army needed him again, this time to fight Germany. World War One had broken out.
While serving in Europe, Jacob picked up some ideas for fine-tuning his electric razor from the weapons he was using. His refinements allowed the motor, the reciprocating blade assemblies, and all the assorted wires and switches to fit into a single hand-held unit he called the “Magazine Repeating Razor.” Replacement blades were sold in clips like magazines that loaded into the razor. However, you still needed soap and water.
Jacob went back to the drawing board and finally developed an electric dry shaver that first hit the market on this date in 1931. Though Norelco took over production of his reciprocating blade electric razor, you can still find Jacob Schick’s name on products in the shaving aisle of your local stores. All because he thought a man should be able to shave anywhere he is—even in Alaska.
I’m afraid I don’t really have a tie-in with this story today, I just thought it a bit ironic that our no-shave chits were extended just a day or two before the anniversary of the release of the electric shaver.
Stay civilized, my friends.
LET US PRAY
Gracious God, we praise You for the wondrous gift of life and the privilege of living each day to the fullest. You are with us, never against us, and seek to liberate us from anything that debilitates us in living and working with freedom and joy, peace and productivity. Thank you for setting us free from any burdens of worry and anxiety so that we can remain focused on our daily challenges and decisions. Thank you that You will give us exactly what we need to serve with excellence. Give us also strength that endures, peace in the pressures, light for the way, wisdom for choices, and love for those around us, for You are a good God who loves mankind and to You are due all glory, honor, and worship, now and forever and to the ages of ages.
AMEN
An Orthodox Priest Abroad 