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- Bio:
The clock at George Burkart's Santa Rosa barber shop had crooked numbers that hung of randomly around the face, beneath the words, "Who Cares?"
- It was perhaps appropriate for a man who customarily arrived at work 10 to 15 minutes late each morning, according to his son.
- But it was not a lack of desire to be there that delayed Burkart's daily arrival. The shop, son Tom Burkart said, was "his own world."
- When George Burkart died of cancer Thursday at the age of 77, he'd only been out of the hair-cutting business about three years.
- He missed precious few days during approximately 50 years of running a barber shop, first at Montgomery Village and then at Mayette Village on Yulupa Avenue.
- "He loved his work," said his wife of 45 years, Pearl Burkart, and he also "had a lot of fun down there."
- Born and raised in Tiffin, Ohio, Burkart was working in a factory when, at about 22, he shattered his femur in a vehicle crash. Through a government retraining program, he was offered the chance to learn a new vocation and, ironically, chose barber college, though "barbers stand on their feet all day," his son said.
- About two years later, Burkart headed west to California, settling in the Los Angeles area. There, he met his first wife, Eleanor Distel, and they moved to Santa Rosa. They had two small girls and a baby daughter when she died.
- Later, Burkart was talking about his situation with a customer whose sister, Pearl, was a widow. She and her three children had recently Santa Rosa for Los Angeles, but the Santa Rosa Bible Church she had attended and he still did provided an additional connection.
She became his second wife and their blended household included six children, and eventually a seventh child.
- "We both had come from large families, so it wasn't a big deal to us," Pearl Burkart said.
- Burkart found time to fish, golf and occasionally dive for abalone, but almost never took time beyond his usual Sunday and Monday weekend, when the shop was closed, his son said.
- He was also an amateur metal sculptor and enjoyed welding metal to make windmills and trees that could be hung on walls. Some of his pieces were on display for a time in a Monterey-area gallery, Pearl Burkart said.
- At the barber shop, Burkart was "kind of barber and entertainer," with a supply of one-liners and a quirky sense of humor exhibited, for instance, by an animatronic big mouth bass on the wall that sang "Don't Worry, Be Happy," and, of course, his kooky clock.
- "When I stopped in the shop, I saw a different side of my dad - his public side," said Tom Burkart. "His customers seemed to really like him."
- In addition to his wife and son, Burkart is survived by daughters Carrie Burkart of Petaluma; Janet Burkart-Williamson and Joanne Fox, both of Reno; step-daughter Janelle Aman, of Healdsburg; step-sons Tim Aman and Joe Aman, both of Westwood; four sisters and three brothers, all Ohio residents; seven grandchildren and one great-granddaughter.
- A memorial service will be held at 11 a.m. Monday at the Santa Rosa Bible Church, 4575 Badger Road.
- -- Mary Callahan Press Democrat 8/6/11
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1934 - 2011 (77 år)
