Barbershops

Harold Stone of Mechanicsburg

Mechanicsburg High School yearbook. CCHS yearbook Collection.

Few things have stood out as more quintessential of an American small town than its barbershop, and fictional representations of those towns, whether Mayberry or Mitford, have been sure to portray the local barber, an affable and steadfast character. For generations of loyal customers, a barber named Harold Stone seemed to be a permanent institution in a small town that The Wall Street Journal had once called “the middle of nowhere.”

Harold Stone

Mechanicsburg High School yearbook. CCHS yearbook Collection.

Roy Harold Stone (22 June, 1914-18 November, 2007), universally known as Harold, often as Stoney, was a barber in Mechanicsburg, Pennsylvania. He worked as a barber from his days as an apprentice at age fourteen until his retirement at age ninety-two.1