It’s hard to miss if you’re hungry.
Number 66 Peachtree Street is surrounded by lunch bucket delights: Moe’s Southwest Grill; Blossom Tree Korean; BT Burgers; Strikeout Wings –– even a Mediterranean cafe and hookah joint. All facing Woodruff Park, the sometimes bedroom community of Atlanta’s ever-expanding downtown homeless population. Folks there likely don’t know that over a century ago it was home to the Crystal Palace Barber Shop, the finest of three elegant salons owned and run by Atlanta’s first black millionaire, Alonzo Herndon. Herndon was a former slave who epitomized the rags-to-riches possibilities that Gilded Age Atlanta held for a new class of black entrepreneurs. Today its interior is sadly empty, while externally the three story-structure differs little from Herndon’s day.1
By design, the grandness and sheer scale of his shop was unparalleled in the Gateway City. Herndon already had significant experience in barbering2 and knew, that to be successful, not only did his shop need to fit in, it needed to stand out3 in a downtown commercial center that included some of Atlanta’s most prestigious buildings, including the Candler, Healy, and Equitable Buildings; the Piedmont Hotel, the Grand Opera House, and Georgia Savings Bank; and, by 1931, Haverty’s Furniture, a movie theater complex and assorted restaurants, photo shops and other sundry businesses.4 The customer base was fittingly well-off, and perhaps secretly grateful that Herndon had replaced 66 Peachtree Street’s previous funeral home occupants.5 By the time of his shop’s first iteration in 1902, Herndon’s reputation for exceptional service put him on the radar of every top mover and shaker in the city, as well as with in-the-know travelers disembarking at Atlanta’s nearby railroad terminus. On any given day, his barbers might serve state supreme court judges, influential lawyers, wealthy planters, bankers, businessmen, ministers, and politicians from every part of the Atlanta white community.6 Prominent men like Methodist minister Arthur J. Moore; Ralph McGill, editor of the Atlanta Constitution, and Mills B. Lane, president of the Citizens and South National Bank were regulars.7
This was the golden age of color-line barbershops, establishments which served only white, upper-class customers. By 1913, following an inspired $12,000 European-style remodeling, the old Herndon Barbershop –– survivor (but for a gruesomely murdered bootblack and two smashed windows) of the mayhem of the 1906 Massacre –– was rechristened Herndon’s Crystal Palace. It had no equal. The well-trained, all-black, all-male barbering team8 groomed from 8 am to 8pm on weekdays, and until Midnight on Saturdays. Customers would be ushered through massive sixteen-foot tall mahogany and beveled plate-glass front doors (now gone) into a
“…long, elegant parlor lined with French beveled mirrors and lit by crystal chandeliers and wall lamps. Ceiled in white pressed-tin and floored in white ceramic tile, the room accommodated twenty-three (sic) custom barber chairs that were outfitted with porcelain, brass, and nickel, and upholstered in dark green Spanish leather. ‘Everything in my shop is the best procurable,’ Herndon boasted. It was a brilliant display. Even the boot-black stands were of nickel and marble.”9
There, they could get a haircut for 25 cents, a shave and shoeshine for a dime each, and even have their clothes pressed for 40 cents. For another quarter, they could bathe in one of the twenty baths and showers located on the lower level. Other services included those of a Chiropodist, Dr. Clifford W. Thomas, who specialized in “ingrown nails, corns, bunions, callouses and all arch problems…positively cured, or money refunded.”10 It was a huge enterprise in a huge structure that ultimately stretched a full city block westward from Peachtree to Broad Street.11 Its opulence alone drew gawking tourists and locals. Based on Herndon’s 1902 account book, many of his customers visited his shops daily, most likely for shaves, but also for other personalized services described above.12 Albert Daniel, a customer recalled, “[The barbers] were taking care of you. You felt like you were elevating yourself…It was beautiful… a very high class shop.”13 A full service afternoon there –– haircut, shave, bath, and clothes pressing –– totaled a little more than a dollar, the equivalent of a common laborer’s daily wage. White men enjoyed being served by blacks; it was a reminder of their historically elite, white privileges pre-1865. Conversely, black barbers saw opportunities to profit handsomely from the Lost Cause. Considerable Old South “trust” was required of course: Trust by whites that the razor at their throat would stay dutifully true and nonlethal; and, almost as importantly, trust that any gossip or secrets (even racial conversations) they shared in that intimate environment would remain as invisible to the world as the men who shaved them.
To be sure, grooming entitled ex-confederates and Jim Crow segregationists required exceptional tact and deference, which Herndon and his team readily offered. “I came to Atlanta with the determination to succeed,” Herndon noted, “and by careful conscientious work and tactful, polite conduct.”14 It was a prudent approach no doubt given the simmering resentments of working-class whites to the new black affluence, and more generally, the unrequited longing of many southern whites to return to the time before the “Lost Cause.”15 Historian Quincy T. Mills posits that to shave whites was in effect to “groom whiteness –– how white men saw themselves in relation to blacks [and vice-versa]…in a way that reproduced antebellum images of racial superiority.” Indeed, it was part of the fantasy many white patrons happily paid for.16
For their part, barbers like Herndon understood the tradeoffs and benefits that color-line barbering entailed. Shaving whites was lucrative to be sure, but barbers like Herndon also hoped for the “potential favors and benefits they might extract from this patron-client relationship, favors and benefits many African Americans hoped barbers would deliver to their communities.”17 The Atlanta Independent observed: “He thinks he can do the race more good by creating jobs for them and furnishing them opportunities to help themselves than by discussing the race problem.”18 Even so, his own community would never experience any measure of his skills. White men would not be shaved with the same razor, clipped with the same shears, or sit in a chair that might have touched the face, head, or bottom of a black man.19 Many ludicrous rationales were offered for this –– colored men were harder to shave, for example, was a popular trope.20 Bluntly put, white men would never patronize a shop where black men were barbered. Even his black staff was forbidden to enter through the front doors. Herndon quietly challenged this taboo by installing identical mahogany doors on the Broad street side of the shop to uplift his barbers’ dignity when they arrived for work in the morning.
Another tradeoff was market-driven. The times demanded that even the original elegance of Herndon’s flagship 66 Peachtree Street barbershop would need upgrading. According to Douglas Bristol, author of the seminal Knights of the Razor : Black Barbers in Slavery and Freedom, Herndon’s aspirations to such grandeur was more than a honeymoon inspiration; it was necessitated by the expectations of a changing marketplace:
During the Gilded Age, growing affluence and the rise of mass consumption transformed the marketplace in which black barbers operated, raising the bar for attracting prosperous white customers. 32 Those who wished to remain competitive had to keep pace with the growing American appetite for luxury. The most prosperous black barbers rose to the challenge…21
Around the time of Herndon’s passing, color line barbering was decidedly on the decline in Atlanta and nationally. Shaving had been a key business driver, but King Gillette’s new safety razor put a huge dent in the need for a barber’s daily scrape. About the same time, the country’s institutional focus shifted toward skilled haircutting conducted under the most stringent sanitary conditions, a trend increasingly reflected in Herndon’s advertisements.22 Additionally, new, stiffer city ordinances restricting barbers hours and clientele were championed by the white barber’s union with the Atlanta City Council. But not all favored the idea. Following a strong backlash from white citizens, Herndon other barbers sued successfully in Georgia Supreme Court to overturn it.23 Apparently, the white community was concerned that such restrictions would mess with “the black servant workers, and southern tradition” where African-Americans “served the nation best by serving white people.”24
Black businesses in Atlanta were forced out of the central business district as a result of the race riot of 1906, intensification of Jim Crow laws, and specific efforts by city council to restrict blacks from leasing downtown commercial space.25 City directories point to the urban shift of black barber shops from downtown business districts to black neighborhoods,26 like nearby Auburn Avenue. The following chart illustrates the change over time:
Despite the trend away from color-line barber shops, and despite building owners splitting the premise into two business spaces in 1941, at 66 Peachtree Street27 the tradition of Herndon barbers exclusively cutting white hair persisted up until late 1965. Then, fourteen black demonstrators from Martin Luther King’s Southern Christian Leadership Conference occupied all of the barber chairs and demanded service, but were denied.28 F.D. Cooper, who would be the shop’s final owner, finally relented after a four day standoff. The past had careened into the present and a new future, at least for the Herndon Barber Shop, was defined. One of the first blacks to cut his hair there was then Georgia State Representative and civil rights activist Julian Bond. But the boom days were well finished. On July 3, 1973, Herndon Barbers, Inc. shuttered their doors for good.
At the time of closing, a Herndon Barber, Inc. haircut cost $2.25.29 Shave or shine, extra.
NOTES
- “PEACHTREE TRACT FIGURES IN DEALS OF HALF-MILLION,” The Atlanta Constitution (1881-1945), May 28, 1922 : 1.
The dimensions of the space were 27.5 feet frontage on Peachtree Street, 26 feet on Broad Street with an average of 87 feet in length between. The length varied due to how the building was angled to fit the two converging streets. Some sources cite 90 feet.
↩︎ - After rejecting sharecropping and day labor as insufficient to his entrepreneurial fires, Alonzo Herndon accrued twenty-five years of barbering experience and was sole or joint proprietor in 9 barbershops by the time he opened what became his flagship shop at 66 Peachtree Street.
↩︎ - Henderson, Alexa Benson. Atlanta Life Insurance Company: Guardian of Black Economic Dignity (Tuscaloosa: University of Alabama Press, 1990), 1. As an entrepreneur, Herndon understood the importance of vision and setting his establishment apart from the rest.
↩︎ - Sanborn Fire Insurance Map of Atlanta, Fulton County, GA. 1931 — 1932, Vol. 1931, Sheet 8.
↩︎ - Listing, “Miller and Bowden, Undertaker,” Atlanta City Directory, Atlanta: 1902.
https://archive.org/details/atlantacitydirec1902mutu/page/324/mode/2up
Listing, “Herndon, A.F. (C) barber, 66, Peachtree…” Atlanta City Directory, Atlanta: 1907.
https://archive.org/details/atlantacitydirec1907foot/page/834/mode/2up
↩︎ - Bristol, Douglas W. Jr., Knights of the Razor : Black Barbers in Slavery and Freedom, (Baltimore: Johns Hopkins University Press, 2009), 138.
The shop and its proprietors’ reputation were well traveled. According to the Atlanta Journal, Herndon and his crew were “known from Richmond to Mobile as the best barbers in the South.” Cited from Henderson, Alexa. “Alonzo Herndon.” New Georgia Encyclopedia, last modified Jul 14, 2020. https://www.georgiaencyclopedia.org/articles/business-economy/alonzo-herndon-1858-1927/
↩︎ - “Herndon Barber Shop Shuts Down,” Waycross Journal Herald, (1875–) Aug. 24, 1971 : P5. https://books.google.com/books id=khNaAAAAIBAJ&pg=PA5&dq=%22Alonzo+Herndon%22&article_id=3034,5086912&hl=en&sa=X&ved=2ahUKEwixz8T6hWMAxW2SjABHenUL7Y4HhC7BXoECAQQBw#v=onepage&q=%22Alonzo%20Herndon%22&f=false
↩︎ - Mills, Quincy T. Cutting along the Color Line : Black Barbers and Barber Shops in America, (Philadelphia: University of Pennsylvania Press, 2013), 66-67.
It wasn’t just that barbers made good money at Herndon’s shops, though a full-fledged barber could earn a decent wage: $15 to $25 a week, and up to 60% of tickets exceeding $35 or more. Herndon often took in men whom he trained in barbering skills and tradecraft so that they too might become entrepreneurs. They repaid him with fierce loyalty.
↩︎ - The Atlanta Constitution (1881-1945), Aug. 25, 2013. Cited from Merritt, Carole. The Herndons: An Atlanta Family, (Athens: University of Georgia Press, 2002), 156.
↩︎ - “Display Ad 5 — no Title.” The Atlanta Constitution (1881-1945), Sept. 11, 1919 : 5
↩︎ - Sanborn Fire Insurance Map of Atlanta, Fulton County, GA, 1931 — 1932, Vol. 1931, Sheet 8.
↩︎ - “Alonzo Herndon, Barber Shop Ledger, 1902,” Alonzo Herndon unprocessed collection, The Herndon Home, Atlanta, Georgia. Cited in Mills, Quincy T. Cutting along the Color Line : 68.
↩︎ - Merritt, The Herndon’s : 157, 159
↩︎ - “Herndon Biographical Statement,” Herndon Family Papers, quoted in Merritt, The Herndons : 34–35.
↩︎ - Godshalk, David Fort. Veiled Visions : The 1906 Atlanta Race Riot and the Reshaping of American Race Relations, (Chapel Hill: The University of North Carolina Press, 2005), 30—31.
↩︎ - Mills, Cutting along the Color Line : 62, 70.
↩︎ - Mills, Cutting along the Color Line : 71-72.
. ↩︎ - Atlanta Independent, February 26, 1925, quoted in Henderson, Atlanta Life Insurance Company. Over his career Herndon employed 75 barbers and approximately 1,000 others across his Insurance, real estate and charitable activities –– an extraordinary, albeit quiet, uplifting of his community. Though pursued, Herndon would not sell his barbershop at any price, to be sure his barbers always had a job. Douglas Bristol notes that “deteriorating race relations left…Herndon…committed to building a group economy” for his community, one that transcended traditional black self-help organizations. Knights of the Razor : 171. Atlanta Mutual Life Insurance Company was a key way he pursued this.
. ↩︎ - Mills, Cutting along the Color Line : 62.
↩︎ - Mills, Cutting along the Color Line : 83-84.
↩︎ - Bristol, Knights of the Razor : 138. Compared to his $20 investment in his first shop, Herndon invested $12,000 to double the size of and furnish his Crystal Palace with old world luxury. Found in Merritt, The Herndons : 159.
↩︎ - “Display Ad 13 — no Title.” The Atlanta Constitution (1881-1945), Feb 10, 1918.
In an advertisement dated February 10, 1918, entitled IMPORTANT NOTICE TO THE PUBLIC: “Herndon’s Barber Shops have been doing for years all the sanitary things now being required by the government of many Atlanta shops. Every barber changes his white linen suit daily. Every barber sterilizes his hands as often as necessary. Every towel, razor, comb, brush, and shaving brush is sterilized before and after using. Compounds calculated to kill any possible germ are used in washing the floors…Porter are required to clean all brass and mirrors twice daily.”
↩︎ - Milewski, Melissa L. Litigating Across the Color Line, (New York: Oxford University Press, 2018), 182—184.
https://www.google.com/books/edition/Litigating_Across_the_Color_Line/HJc4DwAAQBAJ?hl=en&gbpv=1&dq=herndon+barber+shops&pg=PA183&printsec=frontcover.
See also “An Unfair Rebuke,” The Atlanta Constitution (1881-1945), Feb. 9, 1926.
↩︎ - Mills, Cutting along the Color Line : 135, 140.
↩︎ - Mills, Cutting along the Color Line : 151.
↩︎ - Mills, Cutting along the Color Line : 8.
. ↩︎ - “Shoe Concern Gets Lease on Peachtree,” The Atlanta Constitution (1881-1945), Dec 21, 1941 : 8D.
↩︎ - Britton, John H. “GA. NEGRO BARBERS FINALLY AGREE TO CLIP NEGROES; HAIR,” Jet 29 (magazine), Dec. 16, 1965 : 6–18.
https://books.google.com/books id=YLkDAAAAMBAJ&pg=PA16&dq=herndon+barber+shops&hl=en&sa=X&ved=2ahUKEwjxjfCTiWMAxUzRTABHQzrEYoQuwV6BAgEEAc#v=onepage&q=herndon%20barber%20shops&f=false. See also, “SCLC Protesters Sit at Negro Barbershop,” Atlanta Journal-Constitution, November 28, 1965; and “Herndon Barber Shop Closes after Picket by SCLC Members,” Atlanta Daily World, November 28, 1965.
↩︎ - “Herndon Barber Shop Shuts Down,” Waycross Journal Herald, Aug. 24, 1971 : P5. ↩︎
PICTURE CITATIONS MAP: Sanborn Fire Insurance Map of Atlanta, Fulton County, GA. 1931 — 1932, Vol. 1931, Sheet 8.
POSTCARD (Top right): “Peachtree Street” Witt Bros., Publishers. Atlanta History Center postcard collection,(1900–1910) Kenan Research Center, Atlanta History Center. https://album.atlantahistorycenter.com/digital/collection/p17222coll22/id/4790?_gl=1q87k6s_gcl_au*NjE1NjQ5MDk0LjE3NDEwMzk0ODQ.
PHOTO (Bottom right): “Peachtree Street Looking North,” J. Richard Laupus, photographer, April 22, 2025.
HERNDON BARBERSHOP ADVERTISEMENTS, from top left, clockwise: “Display Ad 71 — No Title,” The Atlanta Constitution (1881-1945); May 25, 1913: A6.
“Display Ad 51 — No Title,” The Atlanta Constitution (1881-1945); Feb 17, 1918: B13.
“Display Ad 13 — No Title,” The Atlanta Constitution (1881-1945); Feb 10, 1918: 8.
Display Ad 71 — No Title, The Atlanta Constitution (1881-1945); May 12, 1914: C12.
BLACK BARBERSHOPS IN ATLANTA (Graphic): Mills, Cutting along the Color Line : 152. x
ADDITIONAL RESOURCES Bristol, Douglas W. Jr. “From Outposts to Enclaves: A Social History of Black Barbers, 1750–1915.” Order No. 3078215, (College Park: University of Maryland, 2002).
Du Bois, W. E. B. ,Burghardt, W. E., and Wortham, Robert A. The Sociological Souls of Black Folk : Essays by W. E. B. du Bois, (Lexington Books/Fortress Academic, 2011.)
Harris-Lacewell, Melissa Victoria. Barbershops, Bibles, and BET: Everyday Talk and Black Political Thought, (Princeton: Princeton University Press, 2004).
Ogbar, Jeffrey O. G.. America’s Black Capital : How African Americans Remade Atlanta in the Shadow of the Confederacy, (New York: Basic Books, 2023).
Prieto, Leon C. and Phipps, Simone T. A.. The Servant History of John Merrick and Alonzo Herndon, African American Management History: Insights on Gaining a Cooperative Advantage, (Bingley, UK: Emerald Publishing Limited, 2019).