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UNIVERSITY DAILY KANSAN
Thursday, November 30, 1967
Barbershop shaves were a WW II casualty
Continued from page 1
WANT A SHAVE, BUDDY?
Those were the days when customers had their own shaving mug and brush at the barbershop. A customer would come in and the barber would go to the mug rack and pull down the mug with the customer's name on it.
"The mug and brush are illegal now," Nelson said. "We have to use a lather dispenser."
Both of the barbers said they were glad when shaving went out—neither felt they were as at shaving as at cutting hair.
Had good razor
"Some men were good at shaving and some were good at hair cutting," Keen said, "but you seldom found a man who was good at both."
Nelson said there was a time of "about a year" when he had a "real good razor."
"I kept that thing sharp," he said, "but then I guess I kind of lost my touch."
The two barbers explained that sharpening a razor was as fine an art as the shaving itself. The razor had to be well-honed and then stopped to remove the burrs.
"Even after stopping it, if you looked at the blade under a microscope it would have a saw-tooth edge," Keen explained. "You really had to stop it down well so it would feel smooth on a customer's face."
The grain of the customer's beard and the texture of the skin were also important.
"My father-in-law had real tough skin," Nelson recalled. "I'd think I was just killing the man. 'Go on,' he'd say. 'Can't feel a thing.'"
Some men, though, have tender faces. A "heavy-handed" barber would cause his face to burn with too rough a shave. The shave was always done with the grain of the beard, the barbers explained. Shaving against the grain sometimes causes ingrown hairs.
The barbers agreed the best shaves come after letting the board grow for a couple of days.
"The skin has had time to get into shape," Nelson said. Razor
burn and nicks have a chance to heal.
Shaving like cutting grass
Keen added that the longer whiskers provide more resistance for the razor. "When you shave over a short beard the razor may just slide over the top of the whiskers. It's like cutting grass with a scythe. Take a swipe at short grass and nothing happens, but cut long grass and the grass gives some resistance to the blade."
Keen and Nelsen disagreed about whether shaving makes the beard more coarse.
"It's just age," Keen said. "You
get older and your beard gets tougher. Shaving doesn't do it. If you let the beard grow out it'd be soft. When you're a youngster you have light fuzz on your face. When you get old enough to shave you get to the age when it becomes a beard."
"Naw, if you didn't shave it you'd just have long fuzz," Nelson countered. "Shaving makes the beard tougher. I'm a firm believer in that."
Mug and brush best
Both barbers feel that the old mug and brush gave the best lather for shaving.
"It's just that pressure cans are more convenient," Keen said.
"Mixing good lather is an art. You have to have soap and hot water in the right proportion. Too much water makes it runny. Too much lather and it just sits on top of the beard. Good lather is like . . . like . . . "
"Whipped cream." Nelson suggested.
"Yeah. Whipped cream."
The barbers had some suggestions about proper shaving. Besides advocating mug soap as the best lather, they also said to prepare the face with a hot washcloth for a couple of minutes to soften the beard. Then rub the lather well into the beard and shave with the grain.
After shaving, use another hot washcloth to remove the excess
lather and finish off with a good astringent shaving lotion.
However, both barbers admitted they used electric razors to shave themselves.
Scholars to lecture here
Classical scholars, poets and psychologists at the University of Kansas will be busy next week as lecturers in those fields visit Mt. Oread.
Monday, Sesto Prete of Fordham University will discuss "Classical Studies in Ferrara in the 15th Century."
Last year's winner of the Devin's Memorial Poetry Award will read her own writings 4 p.m. Wednesday, in the West Reading Room of Watson Library, Nancy Willard is the author of "Skin of Grace," which won her the Devin's award and which will be published next month, and "In His Country," a volume of poems published in October.
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