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In a lobby on Fourth Street that his barbershop shares with the Youth Alliance, 94-year-old Frank Chavez sits by the glass door, taking in the sunshine while he waits for his next customer to arrive.
His retirement on Dec. 31, after his 64-year barbering career, will close the public chapter in a legacy that spans the quicksilver mines of New Idria, the front lines of the Korean War, and the heart of downtown Hollister.
“I always wanted to be a barber,” Chavez said. “I like meeting people and talking and all the gossip and everything, you know. But it’s gotten to the point where my legs are giving out, and I just can’t handle it anymore.”
Born on Oct. 31, 1931, Chavez spent his first 10 years in the rugged isolation of New Idria and its quicksilver mines. His father, Chevelo Chavez, was an underground miner, and there was little for Chavez to do in his free time besides riding his bike or going hunting with his parents.
“There was nothing,” Chavez said. “No recreation, no nothing. We didn’t have baseball or even a ball to kick around. Maybe later, but when I was there, no.”
During the day, he attended the tiny one-room schoolhouse with, he said, around 35 other kids. It must have been slightly chaotic: the first through fourth grades, he said, were taught simultaneously.
One of his daily duties was to bring lunch to his father, who would have eaten it while deep in the mine. Chavez would walk up the hill to a tramway that transported barrels further up to the mine, where they would be filled with mercury ore.
“I went to where they did all the crushing,” he said. “I would give my father’s lunch to a guy. He would put it in a basket on one of those tramways; it would take it up to him, and he would pick it up at the top.”
His father was caught in a collapse in that mine with several other miners. He remembers his neighbors coming over to his home, bringing candles and praying all night.
“It was very scary to me,” he said, “Nobody knew what was going on. They were there for a day and a half, and when they came out, only two of them were hurt.”
Chavez said that when he was 10, his mother Celia “wanted out.” Chavelo bought a house on East Street, and his family moved from New Idria. Chavelo stayed in New Idria for another seven years, visiting the family every other weekend.
“My mother wanted a better life for us,” he said. “That schoolhouse was too little, and she wanted us to go someplace better.”
He attended Hollister High School and, upon graduating, enlisted in the Army. He served in the artillery during the Korean War, rising to the rank of corporal.
“I took my basic training there in Camp Roberts, when they called me up,” he said. “And then they sent me overseas. But the war was just beginning to fade, so there wasn’t too much action.”
Frank Chavez pointing to his schoolhouse. Photo by Robert Eliason. 
Frank Chavez’ schoolhouse. Photo by Robert Eliason. 
Chavez pointing to Jonnie Solano in a photo of the shop from 1942. Photo by Robert Eliason. 
A newpaper photo of Andy Hardin waiting for a haircut at Johnnie’s. Photo by Robert Eliason. 
A young Frank Chavez. Photo by Robert Eliason. 
Some of the photos in Johnnie’s Barber shop. Photo by Robert Eliason.
When he was discharged, he briefly worked at a cannery in Hollister as a forklift operator, but his heart was in becoming a barber.
“I liked working at the cannery,” he said.“It was a good job, but I wanted something else. I thought, ‘Oh, hell, I want to go to barber school.’”
After an eight-month course, he became an apprentice at a shop in Watsonville, where he worked for a year and a half before passing the test for his master’s license.
“That’s when I came to Hollister,” he said, “in 1958. I went to work for Johnnie Solano, an old timer here, at Johnnie’s Barbershop. I never did change the name.”
According to Chavez, Solano founded Johnnie’s “back in the 1940s,” directly across the street from the Granada theater on Fifth Street. At some point, he moved the shop next to the theater, which is where Chavez joined him, cutting hair.
The shop moved again 20 years later, this time to the second floor of the Bank of America building at the corner of San Benito and Fifth Streets, now rebranded as “The Vault.”
Five years later, following Solano’s death, Chavez took over the business, and the shop again moved to the second floor of the Farm Bureau’s Howard Harris Building at 530 San Benito Street, next door to Johnny’s Bar and Grill.
One more move, five years later, brought Chavez to his current location on Fourth Street, where he has been for the last 15 years.
“Somebody bought the building,” he said, “and they wanted everyone out. There was a beauty shop up there, and they had to get out, too.”
His shop is lined with photographs, including a distinctive panoramic view of the New Idria of his childhood. Chavez proudly points out his schoolhouse, isolated above the workers’ shacks below.
There are other photos—many given to him by his customers—of ranchers at cattle branding, bikers on their motorcycles, Father Ken Laverone giving a blessing, and a group that regularly meets at Taco Bell for breakfast before heading over to Johnnie’s for a trim—like the barber from Penny Lane, all heads he’s had the pleasure to know.
There are sports figures as well, such as former Chicago Cubs pitcher Charlie Root, who pitched Babe Ruth’s famous “called shot” home run in the 1932 World Series. Chavez cut his hair, he said, for six or seven years, and has a letter on the wall from Root saying if Ruth had really tried calling the shot, he would have ‘knocked him on his fanny.”
Andy Hardin might have a stadium named in his honor at the Hollister High campus, but he is also memorialized in the shop, with photos of him as a high school athlete, a coach, and even one from a newspaper of him waiting for Chavez to cut his hair.
It’s this social aspect of the job that Chavez will miss the most when he closes the shop this week, he said. He has tapered down the rigorous schedule of his youth, opening at 8 a.m. rather than his usual 4 a.m., to accommodate his customers’ schedule, but he still thrives on the interactions.
“The clientele is what I’m going to miss the most,” he said. “Talking to them and keeping informed about what’s happening in Hollister. I’m going to miss all the people coming to see me.”
Following his retirement announcement, his regulars have been coming in for a final trim, a final bit of gossip, and a few shared memories, and it has given Chavez a chance to consider his legacy.
“People have told me, ‘Where am I going to go now?’” he said. “I tell them I will miss them, too. I do want to be remembered as a nice barber and, you know, friendly towards people. And that’s about it.”
Johnnie’s Barber Shop
310 Fourth Street, Hollister
Hours: Tuesday through Thursday, 8 a.m. to 4 p.m. through Dec. 31
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