Emil Corsillo Inc. was a US company that manufactured hairpieces; primarily for the

entertainment industry Entertainment is a form of activity that holds the attention and Interest (emotion), interest of an audience or gives pleasure and delight. It can be an idea or a task, but is more likely to be one of the activities or events that have dev ...

History

Emil was an Italian immigrant. Together with his wife, Elsie Koch, he founded Emil Corsillo Inc., the famous

Hollywood Hollywood usually refers to: * Hollywood, Los Angeles, a neighborhood in California * Hollywood, a metonym for the cinema of the United States Hollywood may also refer to: Places United States * Hollywood District (disambiguation) * Hollywood, ...

company that for close to 50 years supplied the entertainment industry in with toupees, headpieces,

wig A wig is a head or hair accessory made from human hair, animal hair, or synthetic fiber. The word wig is short for periwig, which makes its earliest known appearance in the English language in William Shakespeare's ''The Two Gentlemen of Verona' ...

s, and manufactured

mannequin A mannequin (also called a dummy, lay figure, or dress form) is a doll, often articulated, used by artists, tailors, dressmakers, window dressers and others, especially to display or fit clothing and show off different fabrics and textiles. Pr ...

wigs. Emil was the originator of the mannequin wig in the 1940s. The wigs were made from

nylon Nylon is a generic designation for a family of synthetic polymers composed of polyamides ( repeating units linked by amide links).The polyamides may be aliphatic or semi-aromatic. Nylon is a silk-like thermoplastic, generally made from petro ...

. On September 6, 1950, Corsillo filed a

patent A patent is a type of intellectual property that gives its owner the legal right to exclude others from making, using, or selling an invention for a limited period of time in exchange for publishing an enabling disclosure of the invention."A p ...

for his wigs, in particular, the reinforced wig foundation frames (where the fake hair was attached). He was issued with Patent number: 2661749 in December 1953.Patent details
/ref> Most of the Hollywood actors that required a hairpiece were clients of the company. Among them were

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, and many more. Emil died in 1967, but the company continued on into the 1980s when it was closed. The decline in demand was attributed to new technologies and imports.

History

References

Further reading