The Harbor Barber

“Some people think the colors of the barber pole are from our flag,” Willard Zak said. “But they come from the fact that early barbers were surgeons.” The color white indicated barbering, and red, surgery.

The nature of barbering has changed since the days of blood letting, and the profession has continued to change during Zak’s lifetime in Baileys Harbor. He feels that the days of that traditional beacon of masculinity, the barbershop, are numbered.

“When I was a kid,” Zak laughed, “I hated to get haircuts!” Now, his chosen career, is “kind of a joke in the family.”

Barbering was not his first choice. “I wanted to enlist when I got out of high school,” he recalled, but he was too young. “My dad had started barber school at night in Milwaukee, but he had to quit because of hard times.” Flavian Zak had been raised in the Polish settlement near the cemetery on County EE, and returned to Door County to make his home in Baileys Harbor and a living as a carpenter in the Sturgeon Bay shipyards. But he had learned the barbering skills he needed to cut his kids’ hair.

And with his father’s encouragement, young Bill entered Green Bay’s “Voccie Tech” in 1963. After his graduation, he finished a three-year apprenticeship with John Conjurske at the U R Next Barbershop (now Joe’s) on 3rd Avenue in Sturgeon Bay, followed by one year of work as a journeyman barber, after which he was called up for six months of active duty in the Army Reserves.

While not officially a barber in the Army, he asked his wife to mail his hair clippers so he could “cut hair for beer money in the barracks,” charging 50 cents a head.

After his service Zak completed a practical exam to become a master barber. He remembers that he asked Harley Hoffman, the owner of the Red Room Bar on 3rd Avenue, to be his subject as he demonstrated his skill at shampooing, shaving, and haircutting.

While barbers need one license from the state to cut hair, they need an additional license to own or manage a barbershop. After Zak earned both, in 1968 he opened Zak’s Barber Shop in Baileys Harbor.

Zak purchased his childhood home, and with the help of his father and friends, converted what had once been a garage into the barbershop he has now operated for 42 years.

And he has found a good life as the “Harbor Barber,” an epithet coined by Baileys Harbor native Fred Nelson. Zak’s family and friends sometimes call him by the nickname, Harbs. “Harbs, we have to talk this over,” four-year-old Ryker will say to his grandpa.

Zak and his wife Sally raised their sons Brian and Bruce in Baileys Harbor.

“Some people, I’ve been cutting their hair ever since I’ve been here,” he said, a few of them now in their 90s. But he enjoys new customers, too. “I like meeting people from all over,” he continued, “from other countries. It’s like I’ve been in different parts of the world without traveling there!”

He has seasonal visitors who enjoy the experience of a haircut in a village barbershop. To accommodate those who drive up for the weekend, he maintains Saturday morning hours.

The late Thor Johnson, founding conductor of the Peninsula Music Festival, was one of Zak’s summer customers. “Two minutes before his first appointment,” Zak recalled, “a guy walked in the door and I asked, ‘Are you Mr. Johnson?’ He nodded his head yes, and climbed in the chair.”

Just as the haircut began, Thor Johnson entered the shop; the first customer was also a Johnson. “I did a lot of cutting and less talking!” Zak laughed remembering his embarrassing mix-up. “But it all worked out,” he said. “Thor was one decent guy!”

Zak and the classical music conductor became friends during the years of haircuts, finding that they shared a common interest in country music.

One of the advantages of Zak’s business is “I’ve never had to work for anyone,” he said. “I might not have been able to!” he laughed, thinking about the self-satisfaction of being his own boss.

But he has also been subject to the forces of changing times. The popularity of the Beatles and the subsequent fashion of long hair for men “changed a lot of things in the country,” Zak said. Guys with long hair, for example, didn’t want it wet.

Another major impact on barbering came from the AIDS epidemic and the potential toxicity of blood, a factor that affected insurance premiums for barbers and resulted in “throwing shaving out of the state board,” Zak said. For a time, he recalls, some thought had been given to having barbers wear latex gloves!

But no longer did barbers strop straight razors on leather and use hot lather (ah, the pleasant sensation of hot lather applied for a razor back-neck shave!) Instead, they began using electric razors and most, including Zak, stopped shaving whiskers.

Because of allergies talcum powder fell into disuse, and men no longer wanted scented astringents.

But Zak gives haircuts to guys with long hair who want only a trim, and he can do razor cuts as well as the occasional vintage flat-top. He has never dyed hair, but he does cuts to blend with hairpieces.

The archetypal event of a boy’s first haircut has changed, though. What was once a standard rite of passage, complete with photos and a saved lock of hair, has become rare. Now little boys usually go to a unisex salon with their moms for their first haircuts, Zak said.

Not surprisingly, the Harbor Barber’s clients are becoming older, as many younger men patronize styling salons. But not all.

Zak told of a seasonal resident customer, a boy whose father had always cut his hair. But as the young man was entering high school this fall, he wanted a professional haircut. He had made an appointment with a salon before he discovered Zak’s Barber Shop and cancelled, preferring the more manly experience of a traditional barbershop.

Willard Zak maintains a masculine environment. He has “never got into cutting women’s hair,” although his license allows him to do so. “I’ve done it,” he said, “but it didn’t work out well.” Women’s haircuts sometimes take longer than the 15 – 20 minutes he allows for an appointment, and he isn’t comfortable cutting permed hair.

Not many barbershops are left, Zak said. Because all haircutting businesses are licensed as “barbering and cosmetology establishments,” no longer separated into barbershops and beauty parlors, state records do not reflect the difference. Technically, Zak’s Barber Shop might be called Zak’s Barbering and Cosmetology Shop.

“I hate to say it,” Zak observed, “but I think barbershops will go away. They won’t be called barbershops anymore.”

But they will be missed. Gardner Orsted, who is 93, has been Bill’s customer since he started cutting hair in Baileys Harbor. He not only likes the way Zak cuts his hair, but “Bill keeps us informed about all the news in Baileys Harbor and always tells us a good story every time we’re there!”

Butch Hugenroth, another local resident and long-time customer, doesn’t care for salons because “they don’t talk deer hunting or politics.” The clients of the Harbor Barber represent “a cross section of the world,” Hugenroth said, ranging from a disgruntled Milwaukee factory owner threatening to move his business, to a couple of WWII Army buddies who met in the barbershop after not seeing each other for 55 years.

“Young people miss out on the history of rural America when they go to fancy shops,” Hugenroth concluded.

Barbershops have traditionally been male sanctuaries, places where guys not only got a haircut, but hung out and told stories. Men have always left barbershops not only better groomed but feeling that their batteries have been recharged.

Willard Zak regards himself as semi-retired now, working shorter hours but continuing to barber “because I enjoy it.” And those of us who are his customers continue to appreciate that fading institution he persists in maintaining, the barbershop.

The Harbor Barber, located at 2401 Bluff Road, is open 8 am – 4 pm Monday through Friday and 8 am – 11 am on Saturday. Call 920.839.2403 for an appointment.