Thread: The Man

I found myself in Scranton, SC, today.

Now, SC is a rural, some would even say backward state. Yet most places in SC seem like Manhattan compared to Scranton.

There is a gas station and a feed store. I always ask in these small towns if there is an antique store, and there usually is. Usually down a back road in an old farm house, often the only going concern in the area.

"Do you have any shaving items?" I asked the gentleman behind the counter.

He did. Four straights, all either seriously damaged or honed down to about 1/4" or both. A Wade and Butcher swayback Barber's notch with a large chip starting at the edge and extending about 1/8" into the blade. Otherwise in great shape. Heartbreaking.

A man who seemed to be a regular wandered over. "Sam, you shave with a straight, don't you?"

Big guy. Maybe 6-3. I'd guess somewhere around 60, but very trim. Shaved head. Linebacker shoulders. Somebody you don't talk to unless introduced, and even then with care.

We spoke for around ten minutes. His story was that he had been given a straight and a strop by a barber in Pennsylvania, where he grew up, when he was a teenager. He'd been using these two items every day, ever since.

His straight shave, which included his entire head ("I don't have time for hair anymore," he said) was meticulous. I asked him how he cared for one razor all that time.

"I just strop and shave every morning. You have to use both sides, you know." He seemed surprised I knew he meant both the linen and the leather sides, that I even knew what a strop was.

He gets his soap from a man whose mother learned to make soaps as a child in Africa. When he gets low, he takes a container over to the guy's house and gets it filled for $5. It lasts him maybe six months.

"What do you use for a hone when the razor gets dull?" He told me that the barber had given him a hone along with the blade and the strop. He still had it, but he'd never used it. "I tried an oilstone once, I guess maybe in the 80s?" His face conveyed disgust. "Didn't do any good. I just use the strop. It's got cracks all over it, but it still works fine"

"Back where I grew up, near Lancaster, we didn't have anything. We didn't have tractors or combines. We used horses, sometimes mules. We didn't waste anything, and we made what we had last. People don't understand that anymore."

I had a sense that he had had enough talk. I had many more questions, but he was tiring of me. I shook his hand.

I've thought about this guy all afternoon. Since starting with straights just a few months ago, I've bought probably a dozen blades, four hones, a Dremel, and endless quantities of soaps and creams. I've read Wikis and threads and watched tutorials on YouTube and Lynn's DVD and talked with countless individuals, and I worry costantly about gold wash and lapping hones and progressions and pastes and if I should do one or two WTG passes and whether T&H Ultimate is really worth the cost compared to say RSCo and whether there will be another Dovo price spike with all the straight mania, and dozens of other trivial concerns.

Meanwhile, this guy just takes his 40 year-old straight out every morning, sharpens it on his cracked strop, and shaves.

Great story! Thank you for sharing it!
Jeff

Nicely done thanks for sharing that with us. For me it has become a hobby and (I will say it) an obsession. There are probably many men (like the fellow you met) that just shave with what they got and don't think much about it. It kinda makes you think though.

Thanks!!!

Cool story.

It reminds me of the guy who is probably literally the fastest straight razor shaver in the world. His Youtube link is in SRP somewhere. I think his name is Willy? IIRC he uses his fathers or grandfathers razor (one razor) and only touches it up with a few passes on a stone each year or so?

Chris L

I have never posted in the shave of the day section. I never will post in the shave of the day section. I suspect that guy would be even more confused by it than I am.
Great story!

Well, you see there is really nothing unique about that story. If you could go back to maybe 1900 you would probably find his story was the norm. People like us, they would look at us like we were crazy or something.But does that mean his straight is really sharp or he tolerates it the way it is because it's all he knows?

Why do you think when Gillette came out with the safety razor people left the straight in droves?

Originally Posted by thebigspendur

Well, you see there is really nothing unique about that story. If you could go back to maybe 1900 you would probably find his story was the norm. People like us, they would look at us like we were crazy or something.But does that mean his straight is really sharp or he tolerates it the way it is because it's all he knows?

Why do you think when Gillette came out with the safety razor people left the straight in droves?

I saw this guys face and head, and I'm telling you it appeared BBS. He also said it took him about 20 minutes a day to shave. I really don't think these facts support the idea that he has a dull razor.

And he certainly has access not only to safety razors, but to multiblades, electrics, etc., and he prefers what he's got. I doubt he'd endure painful shaves with a dull blade if he could avoid it by buying a pack of Bics for a couple of bucks.

Originally Posted by thebigspendur

Why do you think when Gillette came out with the safety razor people left the straight in droves?

Most people are stupid.

Originally Posted by Utopian

Most people are stupid.

+1 for sure.

One razor?! And he uses an old, cracked strop?! Twelve dollars a year on local soap!?

Pssshhhaw!

This man couldn't possibly enjoy his shaves at the level we do, eh fellas?!

*Slaps table repeatedly in a rousing manner*