After a long and rewarding career, longtime Columbia Falls barber Barbara Jenkins is hanging up her shears.

The affable Jenkins did her last hair cut at her shop, The Barber’s Chair, on Nucleus Avenue Friday.

“The people of Columbia Falls are the best ever,” she said. “Blue collar. Down to Earth. My customers kept me supported all these years.”

Jenkins started out as a barber in 1981 with her late husband, David Jenkins in the Seattle area. She primarily grew up in Montana, including Libby for many years, but in high school she moved to Washington as her stepfather got a job out there.

She met David when he was home on leave from Vietnam. He went back to the war for another year and when he returned, they were married.

They cut hair together in Washington and then in Kalispell, buying a shop near Sykes Grocery after David saw an ad in the paper seeking barbers in the Flathead Valley.

In 2001 the Columbia Falls shop came up for sale and the Jenkins bought it from old-time barber Jerry Belstad. The location has been a shop since the 1940s and they were enamored by the history of the place.

They had to do quite a bit of remodeling, Jenkins recalled. The floor was bad and they use to play poker in the back room. Everyone smoked inside back then and it needed a good cleaning.

The first few weeks they were lucky to make $40 a day, but it improved pretty quickly, Jenkins recalled and it turned into a nice steady business.

David’s health, however, deteriorated and he died in 2009. But Barbara kept on cutting hair, a chatterbox who was always a master at light conversation.

“I tried to keep the mood light and comfortable,” she said. “I’m a gabber. I probably talk too much, but I enjoy my customers.”

Jenkins was also a Columbia Falls community leader, even though she lives close to Bigfork. Jenkins and Laura Bell spearheaded the initial efforts to plant trees in Columbia Falls and see it recognized as a Tree City USA by the Arbor Day Foundation.

And her shop was also a de facto Chamber of Commerce, as she doled out information to  tourists, snowbirds and locals alike, many of which became regular customers.

But after more than 40 years of barbering, she’s planning on enjoying retirement. She has family in Arizona and Washington and she raises bulldogs.

Lance Wright, the owner of the barbershop in Whitefish has purchased the business and property and plans on maintaining it as a barbershop.

Larry Hulslander was one of her last customers on Friday. He’s been coming to Jenkins for more than 20 years.

“She gives me the kind of haircut I like,” he said.

Barbering is beginning to become more popular again, as its skill set tailors to today’s high and tight haircuts and beard trims and shaves, Jenkins noted.

She suggested that anyone looking to get into barbering go to a good barber college. 

\There isn’t one in Montana anymore, but there are good ones in Arizona, Utah and California, she said.

“You also have to be a people person,” she said. “...If you’re not, I wouldn’t go into barbering.”