Peter Tisdale began his career cutting the hair of the Merseybeat stars of the 1960s and will mark 60 years as a barber this month.
After working in and running a number of barber shops around the city, Peter, 75, has run Tizzy's Barber Shop on Rose Lane in Mossley Hill for the past eight years. Despite fighting a number of health problems, he shows no sign of hanging up his scissors.
Peter spoke to the ECHO about his career, his brushes with the stars, and how he keeps up with modern styles.
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In 1962, Peter got his first job, which saw him working for Joe Cummings - whose name can still be seen on a number of barber shops around Garston village and south Liverpool - in a shop on Wellington Road, Dingle. A popular barber's, it counted a number of entertainers, such as Brian O'Hara from the Fourmost and Gerry Marsden, as well as boxers Alan Rudkin and Frankie Taylor among its clients.
Peter remembers these times fondly. He told the ECHO : "W e had all the stars of the 1960s coming in- you name them, we had them. It was quite a time for Liverpool and it was a good grounding for me.
" I always remember Gerry Marsden coming in one Saturday morning to get his haircut. He was talking to the boss and said ‘Just think I’m at the Palladium with Dame Anna Neagle in Charlie Girl. If I wasn’t doing that, I’d still be working on the railway and going to local clubs, pubs, singing and playing guitar’, like he did before he made it to the top."
After three years working in Dingle, Peter left to work on Allerton Road before he had a 16-week spell working on the docks in order to get enough money together to open his own barber shop. This allowed Peter to open on the corner of Binns Road and Rathbone Road in Old Swan.
He ran his first shop for three and a half years before closing up. A short spell working for a friend in Kensington was followed by Peter opening another new shop, which was located in Netherley which he ran alongside Labour politician Tony Mulhearn and Maureen Mulhearn.
Peter added: "I worked with them - I had the barbers, she had the ladies. And then from there, I opened two other shops, one on Allerton Road and one on Smithdown Road. So I had three barber shops going at once.
"However, I got rid of two of them because I was getting messed around and I had to go back to the shop in Netherley - I put people in there who just ran it into the ground. Since then, I opened one from there on Belle Vale Road, just up the road from where I was, it was a larger shop."
Channelling his energy into the Belle Vale shop, Peter built it up to 'a 16-chair ladies and gents hairdressers salon', which served up to four generations of certain families. However, citing burnout, he retired ten years ago at the age of 65.
Demand for his haircuts meant Peter's retirement was short-lived. He said: "Some of my customers were then on to me asking ‘Can you come to my home? Can we come to you?’.
"I said ‘No, I’ll get an address again'. So, eight years ago, I opened Tizzy’s Barber Shop on Rose Lane. We set it up and it’s been there for eight years now."
Like many businesses, it has struggled through the pandemic and Peter has been affected by health problems of his own. He has heart issues and has been diagnosed with a brain tumour.
He has a heart procedure coming up at Broadgreen Hospital before another appointment at The Walton Centre. Living in Widnes and unable to drive, Peter still makes it into the shop four days a week - thanks to the generosity of his customers.
He said: "I’ve got customers who live in Runcorn who come over, pick me up, take me to work, I cut their hair and then they go home, but come back in the evening to give me a life home again. There's a real community spirit, I couldn’t fault them."
As he marks 60 years in the trade, Peter has had to adapt over time. Styles may be different from when he began cutting hair, but he has no desire to fall behind the times.
He explained: "When you’re out, you’re always looking at people’s heads, seeing what styles are coming in. Like the footballers, they all get their haircut for matches now, so you see what they’re getting done.
"The young kids want that. They want to be like the footballers and you’ve got to be on the ball.
"I’ve got customers coming to me now asking for flat-top crew cuts. Now, nobody knows how to do one of those, but I was taught by the greatest crew cutter going - Joe Cummings - and I’m still doing the job the way I was taught."
