YOUNGSTOWN, Ohio — It’s nine in the morning, and the parking lot outside of the brick building on Glenwood Avenue where Ryan’s Chair Barber Shop & Beauty Salon is located is empty. It is a sight that breaks Ryan Gilchrist’s heart.
“Today was our first day not working a full day, and I already miss my clients,” Gilchrist said of the barbershop and salon that has served as the pillar of the Glenwood Avenue community for over 20 years.
Gilchrist is a man who is used to a salon filled with men getting a trim and maybe a shave, women having their nails done, makeup applied, and spending hours having their hair done. It is a place that is noisy, comforting, filled with gossip, new connections, and old friends.
“We are typically here from the start of the day until. And you can leave it as until,” he says, emphasizing that his day isn’t over until the last client walks out of the door with a smile on their face. “The black barbershop beauty salon have really become the black country club centers; it is where we network, discuss our community, get our information, and catch up with each other.”
“Today would have been full,” he explained. “We have makeup artists, we have hairdressers, we have nail techs, we have barbers, beauticians. And the clients would be coming in the door. These are the faces that we see on a week-to-week basis.”
For generations, the black barbershop has been so much more than coming in for a cut and style. It is often the central gathering place of the neighborhood, a cathedral if you will, where members of the black community come together to network and solve the problems of the world.
“When you talk about the barbershops or the beauty shops, these are places in our community and our country, in particular among the African Americans, where these individuals had the opportunity to be their own boss,” said Youngstown Mayor Jamael Tito Brown. “They could not only write their own destiny, but their shops are also the social gathering of the African American community where you can find out things you need. Someone sitting in a chair can recommend a plumber or electrician, and you trust that recommendation.”
Youngstown is now under shutdown orders, and Brown just finished a public plea for his constituents to shelter in place. “These are not easy times for us,” he said. “These are not convenient times. When we come out the other side of this, we want to realize we did our part.”
Brown, like Gilchrist, is deeply rooted to his community. He grew up here, earned both his bachelor’s and master’s degrees here at Youngstown State University, and has held a number of city and county offices, including city council president, 3rd Ward councilmember, chief deputy treasurer for Mahoning County, and was a community organizer for his alma mater.
Youngstown and the Mahoning Valley have a rich African American history, from serving as a stop in the Underground Railroad to hosting Frederick Douglass at several events in the growing post-Civil War migration of African Americans to the valley to the Great Migration at the center of the Industrial Revolution and jobs.
Before Black Monday in September 1977, when all of the steel mills up and down the valley closed on one cloudless, soul-crushing day, this was also the place where blacks and whites held good middle-class jobs and prospered.
The city’s racial makeup is essentially split evenly between blacks and whites, with Hispanics making up 9% of the population.
Brown says he misses his weekly trim. And as a man of deep faith, he misses Sunday and Wednesday church services, another central institution in the African American community.
Rev. Lewis Macklin, pastor of Holy Trinity Ministry Baptist Church, understands Brown’s despair in missing church services, but Macklin has a different perspective. As he says, in the end, this might all make us appreciate each other more.
“The church being the bedrock or the center of the community life, and then of course the communal village concept, I believe this experience is going to cause us to become all more dependent upon each other and understand the value and importance of relationships,” he said. “I think we take it for granted, and I think these kind of circumstances shows why they are so important in value. I think that this would cause people to reflect.”
For now, Macklin says they are relying on innovation. For those who are not comfortable with technology, they’re relying on old-fashioned phone calls to give the faithful hope.
“We’re using the platforms of Facebook and Instagram,” he explained. “We also use YouTube, email, text messages, and things like that. Then, for those who are not technically savvy or have no access to it, we still maintain contact by phone. It’s evolving because we never had this situation before. So, we’re actually concentrating and responding as the needs present themselves.”
Macklin said he doesn’t think any one ethnic group is more vulnerable during this crisis. “I think everyone is vulnerable, but also I believe the resiliency is also going to be an offset. Oftentimes, African Americans are disproportionately affected by the various conditions. The disparities are just inherent, that’s a conversation to itself. But I do believe that in the midst of it, we will rebound and recover. Our resiliency is shown that through some coarse and challenging conditions, we’ve always survived.”
“It speaks of the journey and the fact that our ancestors have empowered and equipped us with a sense of duty and obligation to make it. So I believe that this generation will embrace that legacy, and we’ll make it,” he said.
As of Thursday afternoon, Mahoning County had 48 confirmed cases of COVID-19, with 27 of those requiring hospitalization, and one death.
Gilchrist said he doesn’t just miss the community aspect of the salon, but he hates that people are going to have to go without getting their hair and beauty services done, with none of the emotional healing of feeling that you look your best. “When you look good, you feel good,” he said.
