By Tim Hirsch
For the CVPost
In the winter of 2011 our daughter, Stephanie, and her family were in Eau Claire visiting from Somerville, MA. Our new grandson, Joseph Hirsch Calzaretta, was only three months old, but he needed a haircut. So I suggested to Stephanie that we take Joey downtown to Ed’s Barber Shop, where I have my hair cut.
“If there is any barber who would know how to cut a baby’s hair, it’s Ed Valk,” I told her. “He is the most patient barber I know, a kind and loving man who would be proud to have Joey as his customer.”
So Joey’s mother and I took him to Ed’s at 307 E. Grand Ave. Joey’s sisters, Nancy (then age 3) and Demerise (then 5) came with us.
Just inside the front door of his shop, Ed has a vintage Ford Penny Gum Machine. Even before they had their coats off, the girls spotted the gum machine. Ed noticed them looking at it and offered them pennies to put in the machine. Now whenever they visit Eau Claire, they suggest that maybe Joey needs a haircut. They love to go to Ed’s shop.
Joey received his haircut, with Ed telling us that he was his youngest customer. We took a picture.
The following year, just before Christmas, Ed cut Joey’s hair again. We took more pictures to document Ed’s skills as hair cutter of the young. My granddaughter Nancy needed her hair cut, so Ed worked his magic on her too.
Ed opened his E. Grand Avenue barbershop in 1963. His customers are proud to say that his shop has seniority. Ed has been open longer than any other business downtown. When he opened, the old Hotel Eau Claire was one of his neighbors.
Ed has cut hair at this location for 52 years. But even before Ed, the location had been in continuous use as a barbershop since 1901. That’s a total of 114 years.
Ed loves coming to work at his shop.
“Customers are like family,” he says. “I know their stories and they know mine.”
In addition to a good haircut, stories are a staple of Ed’s shop.
Customers talk about their grandchildren, their latest fishing trips, or the state of their gardens. Deer hunting season is an excellent time to visit if you want to hear good stories, especially if you’re not a stickler for the literal truth. Good stories sometimes require a little exaggeration or elaboration.
Ed greets everyone who comes in the door by name. When I come in with my grandson, he knows Joey’s name, and he knows the names of his sisters and their mother too.
When the rare stranger comes in, Ed deploys his gift of encouraging others to tell their stories, and in 10 minutes he has a name and stories to go with his new customer’s face. By the time his customers’ first haircuts are finished, Ed knows where they grew up, what they like to do, where their children live, and how they ended up where they are.
Ed’s shop is a place of civility.
While he and his customers have different ideas and opinions about things like religion and politics, in Ed’s shop everyone seems to understand where the boundaries of civil discourse lie. When someone gets too close to the edge and tensions arise, Ed directs the conversation toward something safer – like hunting, fishing, sports or family.
A first-time visitor might not notice this fundamental civility of conversation in Ed’s shop.
In the tradition of upper Midwest men, here affection is communicated by insults. For example, the last time I was at Ed’s a retired police officer stopped in. He reported that he’d been at a baseball game the previous night and that a woman there, noticing his new haircut, told him he ought to go back to the barbershop and get his money back.
If others are in the shop when Ed finishes a haircut, it’s not unusual to hear comments such as, “Don’t worry too much. It’ll grow back.”
Ed opens his shop at 8 a.m., four days a week. It’s closed on weekends, and recently he began taking Fridays off as well.
A friend, Jerry Colburn, has a key to the shop, and he comes in to make coffee about 20 minutes before Ed arrives. Others drop by even if they don’t need a haircut. As one regular explains, these visits are simply “to shoot the bull, tell lies, and dish out insults.”
On one of my recent visits I noticed a fellow come in, read the newspaper, and leave without a word.
Sometimes when I stop by for a haircut, I tell Ed he needs to charge more. “Some people think the more expensive something is, the better it is,” I say.
I tell him that if he charged $25 for a haircut, “you wouldn’t get so many insults.” Ed smiles, but I know he won’t heed my advice.
When I ask him when he’s going to retire, Ed’s response is quick.
“Why would I do that? I love coming to work. I want to work until I die,” he says.
“I am the luckiest man in the world,” Ed explains. “My customers are members of my family. You don’t walk away from family.”
Tim Hirsch is a University of Wisconsin-Eau Claire emeritus professor of English. A native of Taylor County Wisconsin, he has lived in Eau Claire since 1967.