Helena Rubinstein

Helena Rubinstein (born 1871 Kraków, Poland - 1965 New York, USA) was a Polish-American cosmetics industrialist. She was the founder and eponym of Helena Rubinstein, Incorporated and became one of the worlds richest women.

At the age of 18 she moved to Australia where she mixed medical formulas and oitments, in 1902 she opened the worlds first beauty salon in Melbourne. In 1908 she opened a beauty salon in London followed in 1912 by another in Paris and 1914 in New York city. Since 1917 Rubinstein began the manufacture and wholesale distribution of her products.

The cosmetics company bearing her name was eventually sold to L'Oréal, founded by Nazi-sympathizer Eugène Schueller. During the Arab Boycott, L'Oréal attempted to remove all Jews from control of the company. This effort was made through the efforts of French diplomats and Jacques Corrèze, a convicted war criminal who was CEO of L'Oréal's American subsidiary Cosmair, Inc (now L'Oréal USA, Inc.). The effort to eradicate Jewish ownership and control, illegal in both France and the United States, was stopped only after it was publicly revealed by Jean Frydman, a corporate director affected by the effort