If you were a kid in the 1950s, there is a good chance you had to endure the “home haircut.”
My father, also known as “Mr. Cheapass,” became a barber almost overnight. A friend had given him a pair of worn-out electric barber clippers, and he saw a way to save that $1.50 flat top haircut I received once a month. My mother, bless her heart, tried to intervene and save her only son from the humiliation of the shearing, but the old man won the battle, and I found myself sitting in our kitchen with two phone books under my butt, just like the real barbershop.
No cape, no tissue around my skinny neck, no talcum powder, no Lucky Tiger Hair Tonic, just a worn-out towel with a clothespin holding it in place. My mother sat at the kitchen table, misty-eyed, crossing herself despite being a Baptist.
My father tried to act like a “real live barber” by making small talk, asking me about my baseball team, the weather, and my dog. It didn’t work; I knew I was in for a massacre.
He didn’t know which guide to use, so naturally, he picked the wrong one, flipped the switch, and tore into my nice, thick seven-year-old hair. Gobs of dark hair were spilling onto the towel and the floor. My mother sat there with a shocked look on her face. The more he buzzed me, the worse it got. Finally, he removed the guide and put the clippers on my scalp, rendering me bald except for a tuft of hair in front for the application of Butch Wax.
The deed was done. I was scalped, mutilated, disfigured, and humiliated. Lucky for me, it was summer, and by the start of school, I would have a normal head of hair. My father was rather pleased with his handiwork and strutted around the house for an hour or so. I happened to catch my mother tossing the clippers into the garbage can in the alley the next day. When school started, she took me to my regular barber and paid half the buck from her grocery stash.
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Notes From The Cactus Patch 
My dad gave me a “home haircut” the day before I went to school. “You look like someone put a bowl on your head.” Not a good start.
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The bowl is better than a scalp buzz, dang that hurt and the clippers got hot and burned my head. I never cut my boy’s hair.
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I never did either.
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I don’t recall who cut my hair when I was young. But by the time I was in 8th or 9th Grade, I wore my hair long. And it’s never really been short since that time.
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Most of my life, my hair has been fairly short, due to my career. Now, at 74 it’s longer than it was in the early 70s during my rock n roll days. Rebel in me.
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Your dad should have “bought” good clippers and practiced when you were a toddler. You would have been proud to look ridiculous.
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Thanks, Nancy. I’m happy you enjoyed it. Yes, those years were tough on both of them, and the hard times did lead to his saving.
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I’m glad your mom was looking out for you.
I remember that damn bowl. I was luckier than you…no bald cuts…I would look like Peter Tork when she was done. I never had a crew cut…but then she cut my ear by mistake…and that was that. I went to the barber from then on… thank goodness.
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Peter Tork haircut, I can picture that. My high school wouldn’t let us have long hair, but we grew it out in the summer.
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Fortunately, my pop cut hair long enough he was pretty good at it. Though once he determined a buzz cut would reduce the number of times he had to sit his boys – there were three of us – for a trimming. We were crushed. To atone, pop promptly had the commissary barbers buzz his Clark Gable locks. Luck would have it, while buzzed, pop got caught in some “official” base photos – buzz cut and all. End of buzz cuts for the boy kids. Good read. Good memories. Thanks.
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I wore a darn flat top haircut until the 6th grade. My father cut my hair only once and I was glad of it. My father also wore a flat top for many years, it was a 50s thing.
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