52 Years, a Head at a Time

When Phil Marquez began cutting hair more than five decades ago, he had a full head of it.

Now, a dwindling number of salt-and-pepper strands surround a mostly bald crown on the 86-year-old barber. The ball of his left hip has been replaced, he has had surgery on both knees, and he sometimes needs to rest on a stool as he cuts.

But his scissors and his mind are still sharp, which keeps the customers coming back year after year to Phil’s Barber Shop on the corner of Main Street and Ventura Avenue in Ventura.

“I like Phil and he gives a good cut,” said Stan Simons, 78, of Ventura. For 10 years, Simons has listened as veterans shared stories of World War II, family and sports, while tufts of his white hair fell around them.

In a time when fast and frequent change is the norm, Marquez is an anomaly. He has lived in the same house since he was 11, been married to his wife for 55 years and done the same job in the same location for 52 years.

He doesn’t have to ask most of his clients how they want their $10 haircuts. He remembers. He has taken his longtime customers from crew cuts to flattops, from the long hair of the ‘70s to the short, spiked cuts of today.

He has watched as the locks of his loyal customers have turned gray and white, and in some cases, have begun to disappear.

Gary Ward, 51, has been coming to Marquez regularly since he was 18.

“He experimented on my hair when he was learning to do long hair,” said Ward, who now keeps his auburn hair in a short, conservative style. “He used to have a sign that said, ‘Crew Cut Specialist.’ That was scary when you had long hair.”

Back then, Ward worked on construction sites. He likes that Marquez’s shop was somewhere he could come dirty, straight off the job, without having to make an appointment. Today, the Somis father of three is a contractor and leaves the dirty work to others, but this is still the kind of place he feels most comfortable.

“No pretensions here. You just come in and get your hair cut and go back about your business,” Ward said.

Barber’s Memorabilia Fill Walls and Shelves

The white brick building at 12 W. Main St. has held a barbershop for 60 years, 50 of them as Phil’s. Inside, it looks like one of the many thrift shops along Main. It is stuffed with eight-track tapes, fishing poles, African necklaces and spears Marquez bought at swap meets and the skull of a baby alligator he tells kids he wrestled to its death in the Ventura River bottom.

Marquez’s memorabilia cover the walls and shelves. Displayed prominently are the varsity letters he earned playing point guard on the Ventura High School and Ventura Junior College basketball teams in the early 1930s. There are also photos of a handsome, dark-haired young student with a winning smile, and a middle-aged Marquez holding four huge albacore he caught in Morro Bay.

While a plaque on the wall says, “So many women, so little time,” there is only one woman in his life. Marquez met his wife, Angie, when she worked at a five-and-ten-cent store on Main Street. The couple married in 1945 and now have four children and eight grandchildren.

A Lifetime of Local History

Marquez was born in Saticoy and raised in Ventura. His father, a farmhand, died during a flu epidemic when Marquez was 3. Marquez’s mother worked as a maid at the former Hotel DeLeon in downtown Ventura, and young Phil sometimes helped her sweep and mop the floors.

Marquez worked at a lemon packinghouse and then pressed clothes for a while before joining the Army Air Corps in 1942. He spent three years working in a base dental clinic near Norwich, England, during World War II.

It was in Europe that Marquez discovered his calling to cut hair. He and his buddies were going through their bags, looking for something to do, when Marquez came across a pair of clippers and his comb. “OK, who wants a haircut?” he offered. A brave airman volunteered, and Marquez gave his first haircut.

“Soon I was cutting the officers’ hair, the doctors’ hair,” said Marquez, who collected about 40 cents a head. “I got pretty good.”

He went back to pressing clothes after he returned to Ventura, but then he decided to attend a barber school in Los Angeles. He got a job at Jaime’s Barber Shop, three blocks from the house he has lived in since 1926. A year and a half later, owner Jaime Sanchez started another business--so he gave Marquez the barbershop for free.

Marquez, who wears a jade earring in his left ear for good luck, gave five haircuts before noon on a recent day. On his best days, he will give eight or nine cuts by 5 p.m. On his slowest days, four. When no one is in his red vinyl chair, Marquez often sits in a rickety wooden seat in front of his shop and reads the newspaper.

Retirement Is Nowhere in Sight

Keeping the business going helps Marquez supplement his Social Security income and gives him something to do, so he has no plans to retire.

“I’ll come in till I drop with my tools in my hand.”