Lip balm was first originated in 1880 in Lynchburg, VA by a man named Dr. Fleet. It was then sold to John Morton in 1912 for five dollars. Mr. Morton’s wife (who’s name is not to be found), made the chapstick in her kitchen by melting the mix and putting it on her porch to cool.

In the 1970’s Suzy Chaffee (a well known snow skier), became the spokes model for chapstick known by the name of “Suzy Chap Stick”.

To find this research, I searched many websites including; Chapstick, Bonne Bell, Blistex, and The Body Shop. The Bonne Bell website was very appealing to young girls; it contained cartoon flowers, a pink background, a title flashing, “We are girls!” “ I have lip gloss!”, “I am emotional!”, “I know what I like!”, “ It’s who I am!”. Nowhere in this website did it contain anything that would appeal to a little boy who would want to wear their chapstick. Are little boys supposed to walk around with chapped lips?

The Blistex website was the most interesting website. I stumbled across an organization that I had never heard of before. “LBA”, Lip Balm Anonymous is a group for those people who are addicted to chapstick and lip balm. Most of the stories on the website were of men who were addicted to the medicated chapstick. The LBA is also against many advertisements of chapstick, which use sex to sell their project.

The chapsticks, which are shown in this display, were used in a survey of my own to find out what kind of chapstick a male or female would pick.

I asked three males (age 20 and 21) and they picked the medicated chapsticks. I asked one of the males why he would only pick medicated and if he would wear the colorful tubes of chapstick and his response was, “I wouldn’t wear that gay fruity shit!” I asked my father (age 49) and he picked the original black tube of chapstick. However my three female roommates (age 20) all picked the glitter chapstick and the fruity tube of chapstick. This survey surprised me because the males would not even wear the moisturizing chapstick, even though it was in a “male” colored tube.

Overall, my research proved that even something so small as a tube of chapstick is a gendered technology.