BY JANET C. WETZEL
The Cincinnati Enquirer
![[Ernie's]](/editions/1998/09/10/ernie_150x167.jpg)
Andy Lallathin, 17, gets a little off the sides, courtsey of Ernie Wilson.
(Gary Landers photo)
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MONROE -- It's a throwback to the black-and-white world of Mayberry RFD. A return to a 1960s scene of Andy, Opie and Floyd's Barber Shop.
Perched along Main Street and Ohio 63 is a small shop where Ernie Wilson does more than cut hair. Known to everyone as Ernie -- and never Mr. Wilson -- he calls his customers by name and asks about their family, their job or school. He usually knows what kind of haircut they want without asking. He knows their kids and grandkids, many of whom are also customers.
In a community along Interstate 75 being engulfed by office buildings, shopping centers and subdivisions, Ernie's Hair Place is a tucked-away reminder of another time, another generation. It's a place where residents of Cincinnati's northern suburbs gather often to swap stories and gossip and share their perspectives about life, politics and sports. Sometimes over games of checkers. "The same people come in here every two or three weeks," said Brenda Wilson, Ernie's wife and a partner in their business.
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THE TALK |
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The top five topics of conversation heard recently at Ernie Wilson's barber shop:
 Mark McGwire's quest to break Roger Maris's home run record.
President Clinton's troubles -- from Monica Lewinsky to talk of impeachment.
The up-and-down stock market.
Reminiscing about this summer's vacations.
Kids returning to school and the start of the high school football season. |
"They become like extended family. We go through weddings with them, divorces, college, deaths, whatever. We're a big part of their lives."
The ringing phone may be someone seeking an appointment. But often it is the mother of a teen warning Ernie not to grant her son's wish for an outlandish haircut, or it's the wife of a customer telling Ernie to remind him to stop for milk and bread.
While Ernie, who will celebrate his 40th year as a barber this winter, is adept at the latest rage in haircuts -- high and tight or a fade -- his business dealings often hark back to the early 1900s when bartering and people helping people were common, not novelties. He's cut the hair of bedridden and wheelchair-bound residents at nearby Mount Pleasant Retirement Village since 1964, and he makes free house calls to some hospice patients.
Ernie cuts the local dentist's hair in exchange for fillings and cleanings. A local farmer, Dan Proeschel, delivers fish for Ernie's pond, then he and his sons, Clint and Cole, stop in the shop for a haircut.
"I like dealing with people," said Ernie, 58, raising his voice to be heard over the buzz of hair clippers. "I take a trip with every customer in my chair. If they're playing ball, we're talking ball. If they've been fishing or hunting, we talk fishing or hunting. It's the same with the little kids. I talk their language."
That may explain why kids don't cry to get out of Ernie's barber chair. They cry to get in it.
Parents say their kids beg for an extra trim so they can see Ernie, a former horse farmer and real estate agent.
For his squirmish customers, he likes to point out the fake bloody ear lying on the floor.
Jared Young, 5, son of Mark and Patricia Young, is so captivated by the barber that while other kids play Power Rangers or Batman, he pretends he is Ernie.
"I make people sit down, and I put a big striped towel on their shoulders, like Ernie does," Jared said. "I want to be a barber when I grow up. I'm gonna be just like Ernie. He's the best."
"He's the only one who can cut my hair right," said Andy Lallathin, 17, of Beckett Ridge. "I think most of my basketball team at Lakota West comes here."
Ernie has never advertised. And that hasn't hurt him because he estimates he has about 1,000 regular customers.
Not bad for a guy who learned his early hair-cutting skills in a barn working on cows. As a teen-age 4-H member, Ernie would trim his cows to show in fairs and then turn his clippers toward friends lined up for flattops.
He now uses scissors, clippers and hair dryers on his customers, most of whom are from the Liberty Township area, West Chester, Monroe and Middletown. Many of them followed when Ernie and his wife moved their shop from Monroe to West Chester in 1984, and back to Monroe in 1995.
The sign says Ernie's Hair Place. But inside, there's no question that the shop is a joint venture -- Ernie's barber shop is on one side, Brenda's beauty shop is on the other. They are separated by a wall to meet state law.
He cuts her hair, and she cuts his.
The couple share far more than a shop and haircuts. They also share a deep devotion to each other, an active sense of humor and a steady bantering that keeps customers smiling.
"I've fired him four or five times, given him six weeks' notice five or six times, but he's still here," Brenda joked, grinning as she grabbed a ringing phone, and counted out change for a customer.
"You couldn't live without me," Ernie threw back.
The two work side by side in the shop, five days a week, nine hours a day, despite claiming they're semi-retired. When Brenda's not doing hair, she's answering the phones, cleaning up, doing paperwork, keeping a running commentary with customers, and praising her husband's efforts and goodwill.
"This really is just like Floyd's Barber Shop in Mayberry RFD," said Neal Jackson, 60, a customer 20 years, who met the Wilsons at church and soon became a customer and a friend. "I come here because it's a family atmosphere."
While complaints are rarely heard, Ernie quipped that he just has people fooled.
"If people go somewhere and get a good haircut, they think something's wrong," Ernie joked, as he worked on Jim Nuss.
"Yeah, Ernie's been cutting my hair 36 years," said Mr. Nuss, 63. "He promised me a good haircut when I turn 65. I'm not quitting 'til I get it."
![[Ernie's]](/editions/1998/09/10/ernie_540x600.jpg)