In case you don’t know, Navy ships had barbershops when I went to sea. Some guys with the “storekeeper” (SK) rating manned the barber chairs with not much barber training and guidelines to make the haircut conform to regulations, regardless of the desire of the barberee.

Officers on ships could get appointments. The enlisted waited in line. The haircut normally took about five minutes. In no way did the one-chair barbershops, except for the chair, resemble THE Modern Barber Shop, Pop’s, Mr. Eddins, or Alberto’s barbershops, which i frequented when i had hair.

When I completed “destroyer school” in 1973, I reported to the USS Hollister (DD 788) and became the Chief Engineer. The Hollister was a reserve ship out of Long Beach. It was in the early 70’s and the men’s style of the day definitely did not include Navy regulation haircuts. Length was glory, apparently. The reserve units of the day were very relaxed in enforcing haircut regulations, because hair was so important to the younger set, it was assumed many reservists would simply quit rather than whack their hair.

It was also a common practice for the wardroom officers to leave early Saturday afternoon on the reserve weekend to frequent the officer club on base. This occurred one spring Saturday when I had the duty as command duty officer (CDO), the senior officer in charge while the captain and executive officer were ashore).

One of our regular officers was a brand new Naval Academy graduate. After the officers left for the club, I changed the watch bill and put the new ensign on the quarterdeck (the only egress and ingress for the ship), and directed him to make sure no one went ashore without a regulation haircut.

The ensign relieved the officer of the deck (OOD) at noon. Around 1400 (2:00 p.m.), I walked out to see how it was going. About 80 reservists were in the barbershop line, spilling out onto the onto the weather decks just forward of the after gun mount and around the fantail. Apparently, hair was not as important than liberty for most of those reservists.

After my check around 1400, the ensign called me in the wardroom. One hirsute second-class petty officer had requested to speak to the command duty officer. I agreed.

The young man was enraged. “I have an appointment with my hairstylist at 1600. If you let me go ashore, I will get a haircut.”

“Sure you can go see your hairstylist at 1600,” I said sympathetically, adding, “Right after, you get a regulation haircut.”

It took almost four hours and a tired barber, but they all finally went on liberty.

Nearly all of the officers who had gone to the club did not return for the evening. Next morning, quarters exhibited probably the most regulation haircuts seen in the reserve units of the period. It also produced more screaming and yelling than one would expect. The reserve officers were enraged we required their troops to get haircuts. Fortunately, my captain thought it was as funny as I did.

Oh yes, all who had suffered the barber’s shears that weekend remained in the reserves. Reserve pay was a good augmentation to one’s income, which suggests, hair isn’t quite as important as we often think it is.