ESCONDIDO — “The usual?” Art Provencio said as his customereased into the 50-year-old leather and metal chair.
“Yeah, the usual,” customer Jerry Cacioppo said. “Straightacross the back.”
For the next 15 minutes or so, Provencio snipped away atCacioppo’s hair, using the traditional barber tools of the trade:scissors, a comb, electric razor and straight-edge blade. Cacioppotalked about his days in the Army, wondered out loud about the nameof a trumpet player in a favorite big band, and reminiscenced aboutthe early days of Escondido, where he’s lived since 1937.
As he tidied up the last stray hairs he cut, Provencio broke thenews.
“I guess you know I’m closing the shop Saturday.”
“Now I’ve got to find another barber,” Cacioppo said. “We’relosing one of the best barbers in town. I never got a bad haircuthere.”
Provencio recommended Grand Avenue Barber Shop, which has boughthis chairs and charges the same for haircuts.
It’s a conversation he has had many times the last few weeks ashe prepares to close Arcade Barber Shop — at 218 E. Grand Ave. –the city’s oldest barber shop.
As the only barber in the three-chair shop he owns, Provenciousually has a line of people waiting for haircuts. Customers oftenare waiting for him to open his doors at 7 a.m., and at slow times,his buddies from neighboring shops stop by to shoot the breeze.
“One day I let Art cut my hair,” said Scott Kuhnly, who for 39years had owned the art gallery next door and often holds court atArcade. “I had been warned. I went home and my dog didn’t recognizeme. He growled and ran out the door, right through the screen. Inever saw him again. And my wife almost left me.”
Provencio rolled his eyes, having heard the story a thousandtimes before. Still, he had to smile, even when Kuhnly repeated thesame story minutes later to the next customer.
At 73, Provencio is hanging up his scissors and moving toIllinois to be with his children and grandchildren. He and his wifeof 40 years, Loraine, have lived in Escondido since moving fromTucson in 1976.
After cutting hair in Tucson for 22 years, Provencio followedhis brother and sister to San Diego County. He and his brother,Irv, opened Art and Irv’s Barber Shop in the Patio, an enclave ofbusinesses off Grand Avenue in 1976.
Hidden from foot and vehicle traffic, the barber shop tuckeddown the hallway did not attract a single customer its first day,although soon enough the $2 haircuts began to lure a regular streamof seniors to the shop.
The Provencio brothers soon struck up a friendship with theircompetitors down the road, Jim Donalson and Wilbur “Smitty” Smithat Arcade Barber Shop.
By 1999, Irv was a cancer survivor and had decided to call itquits and move to Missouri, where he still lives. Not eager to runthe shop on his own, Art Provencio accepted an invitation fromDonalson to join him at Arcade, which Donalson joined in 1947.
After 18 years of looking at a wall across the hallway,Provencio said he welcomed moving into Arcade, which has a windowfacing Grand Avenue. Regulars walk by and wave, sometimes stoppingin impulsively for a haircut or just to say hi to their favoritebarber.
Donalson suffered a mild stroke a few years ago and sold theshop to Provencio and retired, but still stops by when Provencioneeds a haircut.
Smith died in a traffic accident a few years ago, and mostrecently a woman who had been working at Arcade left to workelsewhere, leaving Provencio to go it alone in the shop’s finalmonths.
“It’s kind of sad saying goodbye to some of these oldcustomers,” Provencio said. “I know more or less about all theirlives. I’ve been cutting their hair so long.”
Provencio cuts only boys’ and men’s hair, leaving the fancierstyles for saloons that offer a variety of services. A sign on theback wall outlines everything offered in Provencio shop. It reads,”Haircuts, $12.”
A few posters of dolphins and an array of model cars on a shelfmake up the balance of the shop’s modest decor. Easy-listeningmusic Provencio compiled on six-hour VHS tapes plays throughout theday. The soft music doesn’t seem to keep away youngsters who havebecome customers since short hair became fashionable a few yearsago.
“I have some who come every seven or eight days,” he said abouthis most regular customers. “They come in, and I don’t know whatthey want me to cut. “
Provencio doesn’t like to talk about politics in the shop, buteverything else seems fair game. Photographer Alex Slattery, whohas a studio down the hall from the barber shop, often stops by tohang out at the shop with Provencio and Kuhnly.
A compulsive jokester, Kuhnly spotted a customer in Provencio’schair and walked up to him and pretended to check for wounds.Provencio got him back by telling him to use thicker paint on hisartwork because the numbers are showing through.
“I’ll probably get a lot more done, Art, when you’re gone,”Kuhnly admitted as he thought about the hours he spends in thebarber shop instead of his art studio.
While the scissors will go silent for the first time in morethan 60 years at the Arcade this Saturday, Provencio said he hopesto pick up a part-time job as a barber after moving toIllinois.
For now, his final few customers are keeping him busy. Anotherwalked in as the barber and painter were remembering their decadeson Grand Avenue. Provencio recognized him as a regular.
“The usual?” he said as he picked up his comb and scissors.
Contact staff writer Gary Warth at (760) 740-5410 orgwarth@nctimes.com.
