Barbershop sticks to ways of the past

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Tim Adams never knows who will walk into his barbershop in Old Town Clovis.
He likes to keep it simple.

There are no phones or appointments at the Clovis Barber Shop. Those in need of a haircut show up and wait.

Toddlers scream in vintage barber chairs and a 90-year-old woman requests her favorite short cut. Clovis High School drama students get retro hair styles for "South Pacific" and a leathery man in cowboy boots says, "Just take it down a little bit."

This 150-square-foot room draws a more diverse crowd than a hospital or bar.

Trang DeHaeseleer brought her two boys for a haircut a couple of days before New Year's Eve.

She's been bringing them since their first haircuts, which are free at the Clovis Barber Shop.

Eight years ago, she and her husband drove around Old Town looking for an old-fashioned barber shop. They've been coming to Adams' shop ever since.

At franchise haircutting stores, "they just speed you through," DeHaeseleer said. "Here they treat the kids special. They feel comfortable here like they're part of a family."

Javier Mendoza sat in a chair next to 5-year-old Eric DeHaeseleer.

Mendoza, a mechanic for the Coast Guard, is visiting from Hawaii. The 1997 Buchanan High School graduate has been getting haircuts at the Clovis Barber Shop since he was in seventh grade.

"I was getting into trouble at work because my hair was getting too long," he said. "I wanted to wait [to get it cut] until I came home for the holidays."

The Clovis Barber Shop specializes in short, military-style haircuts.

A 1950s poster of men's haircuts hangs on the wall and it's not just for looks. When customers ask for ideas, Adams points to the close-cut styles the poster calls, "The Official Hair Styles for Men and Boys."

Little has changed since Adams' father bought the shop in 1963.

There are no perms or hair dying here. Just basic men's cuts, shaves and an occasional mohawk.

The same plastic 7-Up clock hangs on the wall, and Adams rings customers up with an early-1900s cash register that maxes out at $1.95. When someone pays for a $9 haircut, Adams rings the register nine times.

The 6-foot-3-inch man with a handlebar mustache is a former diesel mechanic.

"In high school, I never wanted to be a barber," Adams said. "I didn't want to follow my father's footsteps at the time. It wasn't cool."

He traded a wrench for a razor when he was 38, five years before his father Bob Adams died in 1997. Then he took over the family business.

"As you get older you realize barbering isn't a bad career," he said. "You get to visit with people. Tell stories. Of course we don't lie here. We just stretch the truth a little bit."

Customers still remember Bob Adams, fondly known as "Butcher Bob" because he specialized in short haircuts that met Clovis Unified School District's strict dress code in the '60s and '70s.

"When everyone had long, shaggy hair, he'd cut it all off," Tim Adams said.

The Clovis Barber Shop is stocked with old-fashioned tools, powders and brushes.

Adams shaves faces with a straight-edge razor, smooths talc on itchy necks and runs tonic — a scented oil — through hair.

A box of Wildroot Wave Powder leans against the wall. The 1960s powder turns into hair gel when mixed with water.

Customers rave about the Clovis Barber Shop's flat top.

"We probably do more flat tops than anywhere else in the state," said Joe Denham, the only other barber at Adams' shop.

Denham, 55, left retirement to cut hair at the Clovis Barber Shop — a piece of the past that's harder and harder to find.

"There's not too many of them around anymore," he said. "Everybody wants the foo foo stuff."

He handed a lollipop to a 5-year-old with wet, combed hair and motioned for his next customer, a 1955 Clovis High graduate.

"What happened? I didn't think you could get any uglier," he said, joking about the man's shaggy white hair and beard.

Moments later a clean-shaven man with ruddy cheeks appeared, chatting about Bob Adams, "the pool king of Clovis High."

Tim Adams rang the register nine times and Denham swept up a mix of gray, black and brown hair off the floor.

It was just a few moments of calm before the next rush of customers.

"I'll be here till I quit cutting hair or die," Denham said. "Whichever comes first."