Local Barber Hanging Up The Clippers After Giving Thousands Of Haircuts

PITTSBURGH (KDKA) -- Marcelino Cansino has given thousands of haircuts in his 61 years as a barber.

For the owner of Marcel's Salon in Oakland, cutting hair is an art.

"You just keep going," says the man better known as Marcel. "You know what you're doing."

Growing up in Duquesne, the millworker's son chose to take a different direction.

"I'm glad I picked what I did," he says, "and if it was to be doing it again, I'd do the same thing again."

But now, his shop in Webster Hall is closing down.

"I'm just leaving because I think it's time," the barber says. "At 88, don't you think it's time?"

Marcel's Salon hair stylist Linda Moneck has learned from the best: her father.

"The inspiration comes from him, always getting up and going and doing and making me feel the same way," she says. "There's no end to his energy."

Pirates' legend Roberto Clemente is one of many customers who passed in and out of the barber's life.

"They get married and they go through life, and if they think of me, 'He did a pretty good job,'" says Marcel.

Linda will continue cutting hair at Gregory's Hair Design, a couple blocks away from Webster Hall.

And her dad?

Marcel says he plans to get a day or two a week in at the new location. So, what was that about retiring?

"You don't want to say, 'I quit,' because then you close your mind to the outside world," he says.

Marcel's will be gone. But not Marcel.

RELATED LINKS:
More Local News
More Reports by Dave Crawley