George Miller – a popular barber despite missing a hand
GEORGE MILLER has made a name for himself as a prominent barber in Albert Town, Trelawny for approximately 30 years, despite having only one hand, and what others may see as a physical impairment is a means by which he inspires others to do their best.
Miller, who has lived in Albert Town all his life, told The Gleaner that he took up barbering as a full-time profession after losing his hand in 1995 while working at a bakery in the community.
“I was working at a bakery here in Albert Town, and the machine that milled the bread caught my hand. I was not the first person it happened to, but eventually my hand had to be amputated, because it wasn’t treated or attended to properly at the hospital. When I went to Kingston for treatment, they said that what the doctor should do was to just dress it and send me off,” Miller recounted.
“My hand started to change and get black; it was the palm of the hand, and while the accident didn’t break any bone in the hand, there was a split in the middle, and when they sent me off to Kingston, the hand changed in the middle. They said it seemed like it was slow poisoning, so they had to amputate it so that it wouldn’t spread,” Miller added.
With his job at the bakery no longer an option following the amputation, Miller turned to barbering to earn his living, having previously attempted that vocation prior to his accident, but not having been interested in it at the time.
MORE INTEREST
“I used to do barbering before I lost my hand, but it wasn’t that interesting. You know how you do something because you can do it, but it was not part of me. I never found it that interesting until I lost my hand, then I realised it is a trade that I would have to live off of,” said Miller. “I picked it back up in 1998, and took interest in it because now I have to live off this trade and take care of my family.”
Since then, Miller continues to amaze new acquaintances who come to his barbershop and see what he is capable of, as he expertly uses his hand to wield his scissors and shears while using the stump of his amputated hand to steady the heads of his customers.
Customers often come from as far away as Montego Bay in neighbouring St James just to seek Miller’s barbering services, for which he charges $500 for a shave and a haircut for adults, $500 for ladies’ haircuts, and $400 for children’s haircuts.
“There was a student a couple of years ago who I used to trim, and he used to go to school in Montego Bay, but he always used to come up from Montego Bay. His teacher said he wanted to know why the student would leave from Montego Bay to come up here to trim, so he came up with the student to prove if it was true, and he realised it was true,” Miller recounted.
“One time I went to a barbershop in Mandeville, Manchester, where they sell and sharpen blades, and I went to sharpen blades there a couple years ago. A barber saw me, and he said, ‘You know, one time I considered if I lose my hand, how would I survive, but now I realise that if I lose a member, I can still survive and be responsible because of what I hear about you, and now because I see you,’” he gave another anecdotal account.
Given the opportunity, would Miller leave Albert Town, a remote community, to establish his barbering trade somewhere else?
“A lot of people ask me if I wouldn’t go to a different community, but I say ‘no, man, I would have to start all over again’. I have a foundation here, so I would rather stay here and do what I am doing, because it has become a part of me,” Miller admitted.