RIP Miss Jessie's Titi Branch

Sad news in the natural hair community: Titi Branch, co-founder of popular and pioneering natural hair care line Miss Jessie's, died of an apparent suicide on Dec. 4, according to media reports.

It's important to point out that NV Magazine posted an obituary for Branch on their Facebook page on Sunday, Dec. 14 and while media outlets have confirmed her death, there has been no independent verification that her death was a suicide.

Branch is credited with creating Miss Jessie's curly pudding, helping to cement the hair care product in the minds of legions of natural hair care years before hair care products that catered to natural hair were available on the shelves of major retailers such as Target and Walmart.

What started out as a small natural hair start up soon expanded to an empire: Miss Jessie's was one of the first natural products available at mass retailers and its success is credited with helping the natural hair care movement explode.

RIP

It is one of a handful of sudden deaths in the natural hair community in recent months. Karyn Washington, 22, ounder of the forbrowngirls.com and the Red Lip Project, which encouraged dark skinned Black women to rock red lipsticks, died of a suicide in April. Another popular blogger, Domineque Banks, 27, died of lupus in April 2014. l