#62 Shave & Haircut

Andrew J. De Simone
December 31, 1899 — March 29, 1962

ANDREW J. De SIMONE
Beloved Husband & Father
1899 – 1962

Before I release Amper­Art #100 with a big cel­e­bra­tion lat­er this year, I want­ed to include in the first 100, two specially-​numbered pieces of my art­work to hon­or my mom & dad, both of whom I love & admire, & from whom I inher­it­ed my talent:
My moth­er, who died at 84 years old on Feb­ru­ary 13, 2001, for whom I cre­at­ed #84 Love & Devo­tion, issued this past Feb­ru­ary 13.
My father, who died at 62 years old on March 29, 1962, for whom I cre­at­ed #62 Shave & Haircut.

This was to be issued March 29, the anniver­sary of my father’s death, but com­put­er crash­es pre­vent­ed that. So I spent an entire day writ­ing & edit­ing the sto­ry about my dad. I have stripped out every­thing that has lit­tle to do with Shave & Hair­cut, or bar­ber­ing, and will pub­lish that for Father’s Day. Then you’ll read, besides know­ing my father as the bar­ber, why my child­hood was so rich with hap­py mem­o­ries & abun­dant love. That part of the sto­ry, how­ev­er, will begin with Moth­er’s Day. 

(#84, the trib­ute to my moth­er, is actu­al­ly the 98th Amper­Art cre­at­ed & this one, #62 for my father, is actu­al­ly the 99th one cre­at­ed — the edi­tion num­ber­ing does not relate to the order of issue. The next Amper­Art will be #100, both in edi­tion num­ber & issue. I have no idea what the theme or title will be.)

Dad­dy was a bar­ber. Hence the title of this piece, Shave & Hair­cut. Being a bar­ber was, to me, very spe­cial. I got to vis­it him at the shop which was walk­ing dis­tance for my moth­er & me from our house in Glen­dale, Cal­i­for­nia. I loved the smell of the bar­ber shop, always a spicy fra­grance of ton­ics, & my dad “wore” that scent when he came home from work, along with the men­thol of his Kool non-​filters and Life­saver mints. And his warm smile & sil­ver hair. Here’s what I remem­ber & what I’ve been told about my dad:

Born the last day of the cen­tu­ry—my dad’s incred­i­ble birth­date. He was born in Sici­ly Decem­ber 31, 1899 & came “on da boat” to Amer­i­ca when he was 6 months old. The fam­i­ly set­tled in Chica­go. What’s remark­able about his birth­date (besides being born the last day of the cen­tu­ry — the cen­tu­ry before last, in fact) is that his age was always the same as the year, to the day. I was born in 1951, & Dad­dy was 51. He died March 29, 1962, & he was 62. (I find that fas­ci­nat­ing. If he knew his age he knew what year it was, & vice ver­sa — a mem­o­ry device I could use as I get more & more for­get­ful.) 

Dad­dy grew up in Chica­go with his four broth­ers & two sis­ters, was smit­ten with a wait­ress from Indi­ana 16 years his junior (& left her tremen­dous tips, she told me), & chased after her to Los Ange­les. They got mar­ried & I was born sev­er­al years lat­er. I have always liked wait­ress­es (& left them big tips) — like father, like son.

Dad­dy had his own bar­ber shop, although ear­ly on upon set­tling in Glen­dale, he had a part­ner — his broth­er Sam. Those are their actu­al busi­ness cards in the pic­ture below. Very spe­cial thanks to my broth­ers for scan­ning and send­ing me images of the busi­ness cards, and to my sis­ter for keep­ing them safe­ly stored. There were four bar­bers among the broth­ers: my dad Andrew J., Samuel J., Antho­ny J., and Michael J. My dad’s mid­dle name was Joseph, so I assume the oth­er broth­ers were too. (I have no idea who Joseph was in the fam­i­ly ances­try, except that was their father’s mid­dle name as well.) The broth­ers grew up in Chica­go, then relo­cat­ed near Los Angeles. 

We drove to vis­it each of Dad­dy’s broth­ers who were all bar­bers, fre­quent­ly on week­ends. I’d play with their chil­dren & enjoy some spec­tac­u­lar din­ners, both Ital­ian & oth­er­wise. I enjoyed being among the grownups as they con­versed & laughed with each oth­er. (I recall lots of cig­a­rettes, cig­ars & Miller High Life — as well as Sina­tra, Per­ry Como & Vic Damone on the radio.) I enjoyed all my cousins at those vis­its — Rosie, Chuck, Steve, Cindy, Irene, Ron­nie & Michelle.

Anoth­er rel­a­tive (whose fam­i­ly had noth­ing to do with bar­ber­ing) we vis­it­ed fre­quent­ly was my cousin Mary Ann, who was always there to take care of us when Mom was in the hos­pi­tal, or to help out in any oth­er way she could. Her father, my Uncle Car­lo, tend­ed his gar­den where I tast­ed the best toma­toes in my life. He also brined his own olives, send­ing large jars home with us, & to this day that is a cher­ished fla­vor I wish I could expe­ri­ence again.

Those are good mem­o­ries, hang­ing out with the aunts & uncles & cousins on the weekends.

Dad­dy had two sis­ters & one oth­er broth­er, none of which were bar­bers or styl­ists. I have fond mem­o­ries of all my aunts, uncles & cousins, on both sides of the fam­i­ly. I will tell you about them when I release a future Amper­Art titled Aunts & Uncles. It will include my cousins as well.

As for the bar­ber tools, I loved the sound of the scis­sors with their con­stant snip­ping rhythm. There was the smell of the ton­ics & the talc, which Dad­dy “wore” home every day after work, smelling so fresh & crisp & clean. That was mixed with Spear-​O-​Mint Life­savers & the men­thol of Kool non-​filters. A won­der­ful, mem­o­rable combination.

After each hair­cut I’d get dust­ed with a fluffy brush full of laven­der talc, and then the best part of all (besides my dad’s soft voice & friend­ly smile): The Mas­sage. Wow, I have nev­er had a bet­ter head-&-neck mas­sage since those by my dad, with the machines strapped to his hands that vibrat­ed every fin­ger deep into the scalp. His mas­sages were won­der­ful with just his fin­gers alone, but with the Oster mas­sagers it was amaz­ing. (I inher­it­ed one of them, and used to mas­sage my cat with the motor­ized device. As soon as he heard me turn it on — they were quite loud — Woofer would jump on my lap & start purring imme­di­ate­ly. Most cats react to the elec­tric can open­er; mine to the elec­tric mas­sager.) I enjoy giv­ing a good mas­sage — and I’m always told “Don’t stop!” — so I won­der if I inher­it­ed that from my dad.

One bar­ber tool I did­n’t care for so much was the bar­ber strop. Dad­dy was a good father, kind & gen­tle, but in those days it was nor­mal for kids get a whip­ping with a belt when we act­ed up (I was the king of act­ing up — still am). Well, Dad­dy did­n’t need a belt — he had some­thing far more effec­tive, the bar­ber strop: two thick pieces of mate­r­i­al, one leather & one heavy fab­ric, used for sharp­en­ing the straight-​edge blade. Zowie! That stung! It’s pic­tured near the bot­tom in the pho­to of the bar­ber tools — shown far small­er & less intim­i­dat­ing than in real life.

I enjoyed vis­it­ing Dad­dy’s bar­ber shop. I’d walk to there with mom, or Dad­dy would dri­ve me to be his “assis­tant” at the shop. I would sweep up the hair on the floor, but I’m sure I scat­tered it more than any­thing. It was fun play­ing with the bar­ber chairs, rais­ing & low­er­ing & swivel­ing them with the levers. Of course Dad­dy would pull out the boost­er seat to give me a hair­cut, and after he fin­ished I’d give him a pen­ny to tip him like the grownups. Does­n’t sound like much, but in those days, the 1950s, a good tip was ten cents. Remem­ber the dit­ty “Shave & a Hair­cut, two bits”? Two bits meant 25 cents, and I recall hair­cuts in those days weren’t much more than that — well, dou­ble, but still only 50 cents. I don’t know how we ate so well, steak just about every night with full-​on sal­ad, veg­eta­bles, pota­toes & dessert — unless Mom made her incred­i­ble veg­etable beef soup, or lasagna, or spaghet­ti & meat­balls, all from scratch — on a bar­ber’s salary.

Get­ting back to bar­ber­ing, I soaked up how my dad inter­act­ed with his cus­tomers. He was gre­gar­i­ous, cheer­ful, and always had kind words. I enjoy deal­ing with clients, and I often think maybe that’s part of my dad’s  influ­ence on me. Mom’s too, as she was a wait­ress whom every­one loved. One thing I sur­mise is that I get my artis­tic tal­ent from both my par­ents: the con­cep­tu­al & let­ter­ing side from my dad (who had beau­ti­ful hand­writ­ing) with the whim­si­cal influ­ence of Ital­ian her­itage; & the design aspect from my moth­er (who told me once she would love to have been an archi­tect) with the log­ic & exact­ness stem­ming from my Ger­man her­itage. As for my per­fec­tion­ism — that’s just a char­ac­ter defect.

Dad­dy always had a box of Life­savers (twelve rolls) in his bar­ber shop. In those days they were used as breath mints. He usu­al­ly had Spear-​O-​Mint, but some­times Cryst-​O-​Mint. I liked those; they were Cryst‑O clear. (My favorites, though, were But­ter Rum & a strange­ly minty Choc-​O-​Late, which is no longer made. Every Sun­day Dad­dy would take me, and even­tu­al­ly my broth­ers & sis­ter after they were born, to Sav-​On Drug Store to stock up on the usu­al for the week: First, each of us got a nick­el ice cream cone, & there was a lot of ice cream on them for just a nick­el. What I remem­ber most about the ice cream counter was the beau­ti­ful red & white sign with just a touch of green, spelling out Car­na­tion Ice Cream with an illus­tra­tion of a striped car­na­tion — the type that’s white, rimmed with red. We had all sorts of car­na­tions grow­ing along the side of our house. To this day the striped car­na­tion, just like in the ice cream sign, is my favorite flower. 

After the ice cream cones, we would head to the can­dy aisle where Dad­dy would get a box of Life­savers for the bar­ber shop. I don’t recall if he’d grab his car­ton or two of Kools on our Sun­day errand, or get them from the liquor store across from the bar­ber shop. Most like­ly he sent a kid over to pick them up and would tip the kid as much as the cig­a­rettes cost. He was like that.

Final­ly, back in the can­dy aisle, Dad­dy would pick up a Cup-​O-​Gold can­dy cup which was a spe­cial treat he’d give Mom. Some­times she would share hers with me. They are deli­cious (like a Reese’s peanut but­ter cup but instead of peanut but­ter there’s marsh­mal­low and almonds in a cup of choco­late) but hard to find. Once in awhile I see them & when I do I stock up.

Dad­dy died at 62 (in 1962) from emphy­semia, & I’ll nev­er for­get the eerie wheez­ing sound of the oxy­gen machine he sat at for 15 or 30 min­utes every day for the past months or years of his life. They weren’t silent portable devices like they have today, but a large met­al appa­ra­tus with shiny steel arms & a huge floor-​standing tank with knobs & guages & a hor­ri­fy­ing mask. I can still hear his tremen­dous cough­ing echo­ing in the tiled bath­room, espe­cial­ly in the morn­ing as he was get­ting ready for work. I under­stand he had malar­ia as a child, but no doubt it was the Kool non-​filters that killed him. I have nev­er smoked for that rea­son. (In those days, the mid-​20th cen­tu­ry, smok­ing was the norm. But our mom quit even­tu­al­ly, & lived to 84.)

Towards the end — pri­or to the stroke that caused him to go blind for the last days of his life — Dad­dy’s health was get­ting pro­gres­sive­ly worse. But he kept suit­ing up & show­ing up to take care of his loy­al cus­tomers. (My dad would dress up in a crisp white shirt, suit & tie every­day that he served his cus­tomers, then add a white bar­ber smock over that when he got to work.) His cus­tomers were tru­ly loy­al. As his health dete­ri­o­rat­ed so did his hair­cuts. Shab­by as they were, his cus­tomers would have no one else cut their hair. They sim­ply loved my father. That’s one of the finest tes­ti­monies I have ever heard about any­one. And right before he took his last breath, he told my mom to grab an enve­lope out of his coat pock­et & give it to his broth­er. It was pay­ment in full for a loan. My dad had integrity. 

I may or may not have cried between his pass­ing & the funer­al; I don’t remem­ber. Was I try­ing to be brave, now “the man of the house” at just 10 years old? Did I not tru­ly com­pre­hend my father’s life had end­ed? I’m not sure. But I vivid­ly recall burst­ing out in tears upon see­ing Dad­dy lying still in the cof­fin. It final­ly hit me. I can actu­al­ly feel that moment right now.