Charleston Had It All (((( The Series )))

Charleston Had It All      #8  Barber Shops continued 
Mildred Reeves Burnett

George Monahan worked for Wright’s Barber Shop 1936 and during the flood of 1937.  He would put in a days’ work cutting hair and shaving his customers, but would leave around five o’clock to go walk the levy.  There were numerous men walking the levy night and day watching for a leak or someone blowing it.  The Mississippi River was above flood stage and rampaging at that time. 

Young Jack Wright was being shoved out of bed at six every workday morning.  He hoofed it to the barber shop through rain, shine, sleet or snow to stoke the coal stove in the back room, so to have hot water. Water was piped into the stove reservoir, and then to the sink providing hot water at the turn of a tap. And in the meantime younger son Tommy learned to shine shoes. Willie Williams, the shoeshine man, was already shining shoes at the shop.  He worked for them, until he went to work at B&H Barber Shop to shine business men’s shoes on Main Street.

Sometimes Wright would have to go searching for Jack and Tommy after they’d quietly disappeared through the back door to Sielert’s Pool Hall, and he’d find them watching the men shoot pool.

In 1945 Merle and Pink’s Barber Shop moved to West Commercial Street next to the New Theatre.  All along Wright was teaching his youngest sons Charles and Bill to shine shoes.  In 1949 Pink Bastin retired. The Barber Shop was then named Wright’s Barber Shop.

Not only did Wright cut men’s hair, he cut women’s as well.  Marguerite Love liked the way Wright cut hair, so she’d sashay into the barber shop and say, “Honey, I want you to cut my hair just like this pretty woman in the magazine. Now, Honey, don’t cut it too short, Billy won’t like it.”   Dodge Lutz Ryder (C.I.“Peachy” Lutz’s Sister) was also a customer.

 In 1960 Wright retired and closed the shop.  By then shaves were a dollar, haircuts—one and a quarter, and flattops a buck fifty.

In 1961 Jack Wright reopened the shop next to Famous Bargain Store behind Friedman’s. His father Merle ambled into the shop to help with haircuts and shaves when needed.  In 1965 Jack moved the shop back to East Commercial across the street from where it began.  Wright’s Barber Shop closed permanently in 1970.

Stanfill Barber Shop was located on North Main Street next to Bondurant & Ogilvie Drug Store where State Farm Insurance is presently. Charlie Stanfill was owner and a barber. The shop was large with five barber chairs. It had a penny pin-ball machine, which attracted the young boys.  The youngsters saved to have two or three pennies in their pockets to play the machine when they went there to get a haircut. B & H Barber Shop moved there later.

Fred Defield’s momma took him to Stanfill’s to get a haircut once in a while. 

 One day back in 1931 when Fred was 6 years old he pranced in to the barber shop alone real excited. He told Mr. Griffin to cut his hair all off, that he was going to be the monkey in the circus show his friends were putting on. The barber lifted him up on the board they always placed across the chair arms to make kids easier to reach.  He then took out his scissors and comb, and cut away.  When Fred saw himself in the mirror, his heart sank.  He knew he was in heap of trouble, for he looked like a peeled onion.

 Fred walked sheepishly into his home with his head tucked low. His mother Etna gasped when she saw her boy’s bald head.  She spun on her heels and sailed out the door raging.   Into the barber shop, she huffed and gave Charlie Stanfill a good tongue-lashing.  Pretty soon she marched back in the house with her good friend, Dora Taylor, right behind her, “Click Clack!  Click Clack!”  Fred could hear his mom stomping through the house and slamming doors. He knew he was about to get a good thrashing and under the bed he scrambled.   

 Etna DeField and Dora Taylor searched behind every chair and in every closet, with Etna fuming all the time.

 Oh, oh!  Fred could hear them walking his way.  He quivered and quaked when his momma threw back the bedspread and looked under the bed. Just as she reached for him, he grabbed hold the bed springs and held on tight.  His mom tried and tried to reach him, but no luck.   She and Dora then rolled the bed around trying to shake him loose, but Fred hung on tight to the bed-springs for dear life. Finally they got a broom and mop and poked at him, until they got him loose and out.  Then they made him look at himself in the mirror, so he’d never make the mistake of asking for the pealed-onion cut again.

Fred DeField later became our state representative.

It has been said that at one time there were eight barber shops in town.  Griffin Barber Shop was on West Commercial Street around 1937- 38.  There was also one behind Friedman’s Department Store.  Next to that barber shop was Walter Beck’s Saloon 1936-37.   

On Saturday night the Barber shops stayed open, until two o’clock Sunday morning, so those who had been working in the stores could get a haircut after twelve o’clock closing time.  During the night the barber would poke his head out the door to see if the stores were still open.  Also, up and down the streets every little bit, the store clerks poked their heads out to see if the other stores were closing yet.

And so it goes.