In a 1972 issue of “Ebony” magazine dedicated to “The Black Male,” Charles Gordon, a 23 year-old employee of American Airlines, had this to say, “In time the new rules will be made, but until then, all brothers should really have something on their minds as to getting over on the man. We are all warriors.”
34 years later, Gordon, a resident of Gum Springs who has been a barber and cosmetologist for the last 32 years, said that things have only gotten worse. “The man can come in all kind of colors, forms and shapes, anybody that oppresses you. [Today] I think it’s chaos. The struggle that we was going through then, we totally lost so much. The black male has been incarcerated so much. Kids are out here fatherless.”
Gordon was born in 1949, and raised by his grandparents. He attended Drew Smith Elementary. When his family moved to Alexandria he attended Parker Gray High School and then George Washington High School after integration. He was expelled from George Washington after fighting a white male classmate who was harassing a black female classmate.
Gordon put his barbering studies on hold when he was hired by American Airlines as part of an affirmative action program. After working for American more than a decade, he was fired for accidentally bumping a vehicle into an airplane. Gordon returned to his passion, cutting hair, and stayed in the business until the present day.
He was incarcerated for 11 months in the early 1980’s because of crimes related to his addictions to alcohol and drugs. He married his fourth wife Denise after being released. They are still married today.
Gordon started his own business, Solutions Beauty Salon, in 1992. It attracts loyal customers from as far away as North and South Carolina. But Gordon’s business, and his life, were put in jeopardy in 1995 when he went into the hospital for surgery on a clogged artery in his leg, he contracted gangrene from the surgery and had to have the leg amputated. He spent six months in the hospital, hallucinating from heavy pain-killers, but eventually found himself back in his beauty parlor.
Gordon is active in Ventures In Community and was on the Board of Directors of the Mount Vernon-Lee Chamber of Commerce from 1999-2002. He was appointed by Lee District Supervisor Dana Kauffman to the advisory board in the Gum Springs Community Center. At Bethlehem Baptist church he is in the Elder Kinfolk Ministries. Gordon is also a painter, whose work has been exhibited throughout the area.
Gordon has four grown children. His youngest daughter just graduated from Virginia Wesleyan in Virginia Beach.
What was it like to grow up in Gum Springs and go to school there?
“Gum Springs was a swamp. When it rains it pours and you get flooded. [In the early fifties,] it didn’t have electric lights. It didn’t have running water … What I realized more than anything at all was how prejudiced it was in this community. It’s like a stigma. Nobody had to say it. You knew who you were. You knew your place.”
“It was all black but I tell you, trying to deal with schools, we didn’t understand why we had to go to school … [We were] not being properly educated [about] what the world is going to test you by … somebody put you in a failure bag.”
How has the area changed?
“The land is changing. They’re building bigger houses and more expensive. People can’t afford to live here. I would say 75 to 80 percent of people I grew up with is gone. It’s like a wipeout.”
“Its hard to put it in words what’s going on. You can see it. It’s deep … I’m not trying to blame one person. We’re all at it. We don’t know when enough is enough, how to help one another. It’s really confusing.”
How can people come together?
“We all human beings. What I’ve come to realize by looking at myself and how I’ve gotten caught up in so many facets of life is we all go through it but we don’t all talk about it … its hard to talk about yourself. It takes another person who knows you to really put it all together.”
Who helped you?
“I’m pretty much self-taught. But it took 57 years.”
Talk about being a barber.
“Being a barber is life. Actually my talents are what brought me through, besides God. It’s something that nobody can take away from me, that nobody can stop me. It’s what I do, as far as art, as far as music, as far as whatever I relate to naturally. Dealing with other people I use my gifts to bring them out of whatever they may be dealing with that might be on the negative side, because I’ve been through so much.
Why are your clients so loyal?
“When they first come in [for an appointment,] it’s about hair. After that, it’s about life ... Because Solution is what it’s all about and there’s a serious presence about God in here. It’s really peaceful. A lot of times people don’t know why they come to me. They come for various reasons. I have to discern them. They accept me for who I am. I think that’s the main thing. 90 percent of my clients are referred to me. I don’t go around giving out my cards.”
On how to approach what’s in your head and on your head.
“One of the things I always say is keep it real. If you keep it real chances are things aren’t going to harm you. If you fall you’re only going to fall so far if you keep it real. If you lose sight on what’s real you’re in the wrong. And that’s what happened to hair. We don’t know what’s real … You gotta be in truth. It’s about being honest … [Now] the field of barbering is such a lie. So many people are ripping people off because they don’t know. So many people are wearing weaves. We’re going backwards. And not only that, we’re losing so much of our culture because of drugs, crime. It’s a sickness. … We’re losing respect. Dignity.”
What was it like spending six months in the hospital?
“I didn’t know who I was. I was drugged … I was a difficult patient to work with, hallucinating. Six months later I found myself in Solutions doing what I do … [In the hospital]I didn’t know where I would go from there. I didn’t see no future for me. My life was hell … after I came back I realized how He put me back there. It wasn’t me, everything I say to you isn’t me … the things that happened to me, it had to be God. You can see the devil in it too. But the better part is Him saving me. I think I been saved many times in my life … Somewhere down the line I might get the chance to do some good work, from what I been through … I been out here waiting for my time. And I have to prove it. And living it is proving it. If I wasn’t 57 I wouldn’t be talking to you.”