Hundreds of people trekked to an otherwise unassuming strip mall in a North Charlotte neighborhood on Wednesday.
They went to Gary’s Barber and Style to see 80-year-old Gary Carter, a barber who has served the Derita area for nearly 60 years in that same shop.
His daughter, Kim Ballard, organized the event to celebrate his 59 years at his 2825 West Sugar Creek Road location. The shop is set to close at the end of July. Carter will work at his shop in Huntersville, which opened in 2002, where he will gradually wind down his work schedule.
Friends, family, customers and former employees dropped into Carter’s Derita shop to reflect and share their appreciation for his work and impact on the community.
One former employee traveled from Winston-Salem, where he started his own barber shop, to celebrate Carter. Others came just to get a picture with Carter and express their gratitude.
“Derita has been good to me,” Carter said. “I started with customers, they became my friends and now they’re my family.”
Finding inspiration from an uncle
Carter, the son of a Baptist pastor, grew up as one of seven brothers on a farm in Clinton, three hours east of Charlotte. As soon as he was able to work on the farm, he did.
His family farm produced cotton and tobacco, among other crops. Carter and his brothers would cut firewood, operate a tractor and feed the animals to help on the farm.
He recalled that the youngest children on the farm would fashion reeds and a large stick into a broom and sweep the sandy yard.
He also helped out at his uncle’s farm. His uncle worked as a part-time, informal barber. Carter attributed his inspiration for cutting hair to his uncle. His aunt worked as a counselor at Carter’s high school and encouraged him to apply to barber school.
Although Carter left the farm for school, he carried the work ethic he learned there with him.
Learning the business
Carter started barber school in Durham after graduating from high school in 1962.
Blair Baucom asked his brother, who owned a barber shop in Durham, to find him a barber for his store in Charlotte. Baucom’s brother met Carter in Durham and suggested that he go work for his brother in Charlotte.
Carter accepted the position. At 19, he and his wife, Ann, moved into a small North Charlotte trailer, and Carter began working for Baucom at his shop on Gibbon Road.
Early on, Carter found creative ways to get to work because he didn’t have a reliable car. He’d ride part of the way to work with a Coca-Cola truck driver, who made a stop at a nearby convenience store. Then he’d walk to Baucom’s from there.
Baucom gave Carter increasingly more responsibility. Baucom tasked Carter with payroll duties, customer tickets and other business and administrative assignments.
Carter eventually started to run the business. “I got used to handling the business part of it,” Carter said. “I just kind of learned from him.”
Foul language will not be tolerated
When Baucom’s health started to decline, he sold his shop to Carter during the mid-1970s. Baucom died shortly after that move.
Carter said the transition from worker to owner wasn’t particularly challenging thanks to Baucom’s mentorship. He’d already been doing a lot of the owner duties over the past decade.
“When he passed away, that really broke my heart,” Carter said. “He really took me under his wing and helped me.”
He said his biggest struggle was keeping good barbers and managing his employees.
“Bad language on the job is not going to sail with me,” Carter said. “And keeping it family oriented, sometimes that’s tough.”
A small sign in his shop reads: “no off-color comments or foul language tolerated.”
Carter also doesn’t tolerate bad behavior.
During the event Wednesday, he recalled the time when a man threatened him after he declined to give him a haircut after the shop closed. The customer whose hair Carter was cutting protected him from the other man.
Why Carter keeps going… and going…
Carter has worked 15 years past the average retirement age of 65 for an American man. He still works six days a week, and plans to continue working at his shop in Huntersville after the one in Derita closes.
He could retire and travel more with his wife and a group of friends they’ve known for 50 years that they call their traveling buddies. He said he keeps working because of the family he’s made as a barber.
“They’ve been worth every moment,” Carter said. “Shad (Brown) isn’t my son, but he’s like a son to me,” Carter said. Brown has worked with Carter at the Derita location for 25 years.
Carter said he’ll work full-time briefly at his Huntersville location before transitioning to a three-day work schedule. He plans to continue cutting hair in some capacity for as long as possible.
“My wife calls me an Energizer Bunny,” Carter said. “I’m afraid if I quit completely, I might run out of things to do. I said, ‘If I sit down too much, I might start liking it too much. You know?’ ”
Planning for the future
Carter plans to pass along his business in Huntersville to a “hair apparent” similar to what Baucom did for him decades ago.
Scott Enloe, who’s been running the shop in Huntersville since Carter’s nephew had to step away from the business, is set to buy the shop from Carter in August.
Once Carter starts his reduced schedule, he plans to travel more with his wife. They already have an 18-day trip to Canada on the books this year with their traveling buddies.
Although Carter’s career is approaching a close, the impact he’s made on Derita will be remembered long after he officially retires.
“I’ve watched so many young people that I’ve cut through the years and they’re grown up, and coming back telling me, ‘I remember when you cut my hair when I was a little boy,’ ” Carter said. “One guy this morning said, ‘You cut my son’s hair. We had to hold him down. He was all over the place.’ I said, ‘first haircut is going to be that way.’ ”
Uniquely Charlotte: Uniquely Charlotte is an Observer subscriber collection of moments, landmarks and personalities that define the uniqueness (and pride) of why we live in the Charlotte region.
