Cousin Booker's Barbershop

At six-years-old, seeing someone world famous is not something is not something that happens everyday at anytime, but I never forgot it. I remember my father leaned over to me and said, "You know who that is?" I thought to myself, he must really think I'm stupid because everyone in the world knew him. I'd been watching in fascination as the young man fidgeted, turned and tried to keep himself still with no success. Sitting right in front of me was world-record holder and Olympic sprinter Charlie Tidwell.

I saw Charlie Tidwell play high school football when the world discovered him and beat a path to Independence, Kansas to lure him off to college. This particular day, I actually met him and shook his hand and for a moment I almost forgot why I was there--my first professional haircut. The next I know, I'm climbing into the barber's chair with an extra cushion in it to receive a haircut without the entire neighborhood watching.

The tears started to well up into my eyes and I felt like crying but my dad gave me the eye. You know, the eye, the one that silently says, "If you start up, I'm going to tear your ass up!" So, I sucked it up and marched up the gallows for the haircut that I knew would leave me a bloody mess. Once I seated myself on the booster cushion, the chair began to rise as I watched myself turn slowly into view in front of the giant mirrors.

"Doc, how do you want it?"

"Just knock it down on the top and clean the sides," my father said.

The first voice was Mr. Booker, the owner and only barber in the shop. This was Cousin Booker's Barbershop in Coffeyville, KS. Although it was my first time there, it was only the first of many as I continued going to Cousin Booker into my teens and even took my younger brother there occasionally. Booker was businessman and barber as he also ran a small store inside the shop selling haircare products, sodas and potato chips.

Going to Cousin Booker's became interesting with each year I aged and I became more aware of having my hair cut. It was then I discovered why it took so long to get a haircut. Mr. Booker was a conversationalist, which my friends and I enjoyed, but it didn't seem the older crowd cared much for it as my dad said Booker was the slowest barber in the world.

After I became a teenager I discovered some of Booker's patented moves such as the "clack and whack," which to this day has not been duplicated by any barber I know and none ever approached the smoothness or precision of just that one juke. The "clack and whack" as we called it was a time killer as Cousin Booker would lightly whack the comb against the head while "clacking" the scissors in the air behind your head like he was cutting hair. Whenever a conversation broke out, the move wasn't far behind.

Since the shop was also a store, Cousin Booker often interrupted a haircut to ring up the register for someone that came in to purchase pomade, either Dixie Peach or Murray's. Haircare products like Sulpher-8, Glo-Mo-Glo and Ultra-Wave were very popular as were Royal Crowne, Jeris Hair Tonic and Lucky Tiger.

Caddy-corner from Mr. Booker's was a young folk's hangout called Glen's Haven a place we all went for dancing, flirting and soft drinks, but that's another story with plenty of action, occasional fisticuffs and the lovely Janie Page. I eventually quit going to Cousin Booker, but I always drove past when I was in town and dropped in to distract him just so I could see the old "clack and whack." World Class!