82-Year-Old Business Owner Passionately Working With Hair Since Age Thirteen

When Mary Ann was thirteen, her father asked a friend to let her work at his wife's beauty shop. 

She spent her weekends washing combs and taking out rollers from the customers' hair.

She fell in love with the idea of doing hair for a living.

After finishing high school, she moved an hour away from her hometown Clinton, South Carolina, to Columbia to attend beauty school.

At the start of her career, she worked in a beauty salon that had a mostly white clientele. She often came to the rescue when a hair color mishap occurred,

She was particularly good at color-mixing for the desired results.

Shortly after her daughter, Zelbra, graduated from beauty school and became a licensed cosmetologist, Mary Ann ventured out and launched her own business, M&Z StyleMakers, where the mother-daughter duo are partners in this business.

Today, June 10, 2023, Mary Ann (Rice) Cullum celebrates her 82nd birthday and 64 years of dedicated service in cosmetology.