Kevin Baum

Roscoe Village's Sal's Barbershop has two missions--cut your hair, of course, but also make you feel like a man in the process.

"Ice cold beer, young man?" asks Joe Munoz, property owner, shop owner and barber--the moment you walk in the door. It's only polite to oblige. He's been cutting hair since the early eighties--if he says drink, then drink.

"I give away free beer on Fridays. Whatever is left over, I give away on Saturdays. Whatever is left over after that ... I drink myself," admits Munoz with a contagious laugh, inviting all who are present to follow suit. Everyone does.

The aura here is mesmerizing. With jazz massaging your ears, traffic-ridden tiles and walls dressed up in Cubs and Rat Pack posters, you feel more like you're in your grandfather's garage--and even though you've just met these guys, they make you feel like you've known them for thirty years.

"Barbershops are coming back," Munoz acknowledges. "Because here, you're gonna get a better haircut than you would at a SuperCuts or a BoRics --places like that are unisex." The prices are fair, too. For twenty dollars, you get your noggin cleaned up and if it's not too busy, a head-and-shoulder massage courtesy of a hand-held machine. Other services include straight-razor shaves and a shoe buffer--you do it yourself on the buffer, though. "I used to have a guy come in here to shine shoes," Munoz says. "But a lot of the guys who come in here these days are wearing sneakers or sandals." He laughs at the thought.

Munoz talks of the shop's past, its original owner and how, back in the sixties, Roscoe Village wasn't the greatest of neighborhoods--rife with gang activity--and perhaps this is why the windows are still garnished with metal bars. But the feeling is nothing less than elating that a place this "old school" can stand proud on a street between Kitsch'n and Starbucks.

Munoz has been asked to join the Roscoe Village Chamber of Commerce, but declined. "I don't see why I should join," he says. "The people who go to the Starbucks or Costello's, they've got eyes. They see me. I'm old school--I don't need a Web site."

(2007-03-27)

Also by Kevin Baum

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Bastion of Beer
Before heading to Lincoln Avenue's Delilah's on this day, the grand decisions to make don't entail attire--as they may on nights of metal, mod, punk or any other genre of rock the bar usually caters to--but rather in what beers from oversea you'll be partaking in. For today, twenty dollars gains entry to the bar's Vintage Strong Beer Fest 2007 and twenty tickets, each rewarding you with an ounce of well-built beer
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Simon Says Soiree
Upon entering McCormick Place's Lakeside Center Ballroom on the 2007 Chicago Auto Show's opening day, it's only natural to wonder where Chrysler has stashed the 2,000 or so people they counted on participating in their attempt to break the Guinness World Record for most people involved in a "Simon Says" game
(2007-02-13)

Bronzeville Gold
Once on State Street and now in Bronzeville sixteen years later, the Afrocentric Bookstore has earned its rank as one of the city's independent staples via product, persistence and dedication. "We're seasoned," professes owner Desiree Sanders. "There aren't many bookstores on the South Side like this one"
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Lost Boy Tales
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