Maybelline was America's first Mascara, 1915. Eugene Rimmel's, European, mascaro, was a darkener for men's mustaches.

Let's Set the Record Straight 

Cosmetics and Skin http://www.cosmeticsandskin.com/bcb/water-cosmetique.php

Given that ‘rimmel’ means mascara in Turkish, Farsi and several European languages, it is sometimes said that Eugene Rimmel [1820-1887] was the originator of mascara. However the product he made – called Water Cosmetique – was developed to be used on men’s moustaches not women’s eyelashes.
Cosmetics and Skin always has it right.....


Diane Penelope Blog

http://dianepenelope.com/mascara-worlds-popular-beauty-product/

In 1913 French chemist and perfumer Eugène Rimmel developed the first non-toxic lash paint for sale. That cake mascara (in a pan and brushed on) was created with a blend petroleum and black coal dust. The downside was that it was very messy and the texture inconsistent. Despite this, it was ridiculously popular across Europe. Rimmel in some countries still refers to mascara (like Hoover and Kleenex).

In 1917, Eugene Rimmel created the first packaged cosmetic mascara. Produced from a blend of petroleum and black coal dust, the history of mascara began with a cake mascara that although reformulated, is still found today.

I have to step in here and say, this is Maybelline's history, mistakenly printed under Rimmel.  The picture on the box of Rimmel cake mascara is from the 1950s. Tom Lyle Williams with his sister Mabel Williams were the first to create a formula made of petroleum and black coal dust, in 1917. Rimmel was strictly a man's mustache darkener at the time Maybelline was founded in 1915.

Original Lash-BrowIne ad, placed in 1915, Photoplay movie magazine.  Rimmel at the time was strictly a black goo for men.

 Lash-Brow Ine. became Maybelline in 1917

Maybelline cake mascara with Silent Film Star, Mildred Davis, 1917

 College Optometrists blog https://www.college-optometrists.org/the-college/museum/online-exhibitions/virtual-eye-and-vision-gallery/appearance-of-the-eye.html

The eyes could be made to stand out by making the face paler, with make-up applied so thickly it was almost a mask. Indeed our word ‘mascara’ comes from the Italian word for mask, ‘maschera’. In 1834 the French-born perfumer Eugene Rimmel (1820-1887) moved to London and invented the first non-toxic commercial mascara.

Again, I want to point out what Rimmel formulated was strictly for a mans mustache, not for the use on eyelashes.


Vintage Dancer 1920's Makeup
https://vintagedancer.com/1920s/makeup-starts-the-cosmetics-industry/ 

Mascara was still in the development stages. It could be purchased in liquid, wax or cake form. If you wanted to try Maybelline’s mascara, the company was kind enough to include a brush, which had to be moistened with water before dipping in cake powder, along with a close-up photo of silent film star Mildred Davis for use as a reference.

"Victorian Era Gibson Girls" home-cooked their mascara from ashes

They also used singed bottle corks and the blackish juice of elderberries. In 1872, French perfumer-entrepreneur Eugène Rimmel invented the world’s first commercially available mascara. His lash-plumping formula was simple: petroleum jelly and coal dust. (Rimmel, now owned by global cosmetics giant Coty Inc., still produces a variety of popular mascaras today.

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Applying Rimmel’s messy mascara was nothing to blush at. Users first dampened a rigid brush that looked like a mini toothbrush, then rubbed it across a gumstick-sized rectangle of a pigmented “cake.” It was little more than a hunk of black soap. With running water often tough to come by at the time, women sometimes used saliva to wet the brush, earning mascara the nickname “spit black.”

By the turn of the 20th century, the concept of mascara as a beauty enhancer had lashed out and taken hold across the pond, here in the United States, only we were still making it on our own. That is until in 1915 in Chicago. There, a scrappy, 19-year-old entrepreneur and Kentucky farm boy named Thomas Lyle Williams watched with curiosity as his older sister Maybel, who’d burned her eyelashes and eyebrows in a kitchen accident, dabbed grime on her eyelashes. She concocted the homespun mascara from what everyone else did at the time -- coal-dust ashes, burnt cork and petroleum jelly. Seeing dollar signs in Maybel’s smoky eyes, Williams borrowed his buddy’s chemistry set and got busy tweaking her formula, which she dubbed “the secret of the harem.”

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Williams’ first recipe flopped. When Maybel tried the oily blend of cottonseed oil, carbon black and Vaseline, it bled down into her eyes and stung like heck.

He went back to the drawing board, hopped on a train to Detroit and ordered a fresh round of supplies from Parke-Davis, a wholesale drug supplier. (Also on a historical note, America’s oldest and once largest drugmaker, Parke-Davis is now a subsidiary of the pharmaceutical giant Pfizer.) Determined to be successful, Williams hunkered down in a boarding house with a few family members and melted the supplies he scored down into black beauty gold. The second time was the charm.  

Next freshly bankrolled with a $500 loan from his older brother, Williams officially launched his finished product, Lash Brow Line. It was an overnight sensation with the locals. William changed the mascara’s name to Maybelline, a catchy combination of Maybel and Vaseline, put his sister’s face on the packaging and an iconic American brand was born. The company sold the mascara by mail order at first, then later in stores throughout the country and, eventually, the world. Hollywood was no exception, where ultra-glamorous silent film stars took to the lash darkener, pushing it further into the mainstream.

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 The Maybelline brand, now owned by French beauty products conglomerate L'Oréal, has risen to become the world’s leading cosmetics brand. To this day, the multibillion dollar household brand sells one of its trademark green and pink packaged Great Lash mascara tubes every two seconds. Not too shabby for a business founded on a hope, a prayer and glorified gelatinous gunk.

All in all, the extraordinary rise and staying power of mascara through the ages is something to bat your lashes at indeed, tears, rain or shine.

https://www.entrepreneur.com/topic/maybelline