By Steve Cichon
steve@buffalostories.com
@stevebuffalo
After having run a barber shop in Blasdell for three years, Al Stock moved his shop to 66 Main Street in Hamburg after the Hess Brothers florist moved to a larger Main Street location in 1932.
Starting in 1952, Stock and his wife spearheaded efforts to decorate the village for Christmas, including trees and a life-size Nativity scene at the village park at Lake and Union Sts. Through the 50s and 60s, Al and Geneva Stock also headed up the village Easter Egg hunt and started a strawberry festival in Hamburg. Much of the Stocks’ civic involvement came through their longtime membership at First Baptist Church.
The Stocks also opened a beauty salon in the Abbott Road Plaza.
Albert Stock was 71 when he died in 1968, having run his barber store in the village for 35 years.
Upon his death, The Sun wrote an editorial about the “longtime barber and civic leader,” saying he was “a man dedicated to (the community’s) betterment and over the years zealous for many thing which gave this village added character and civic pride.”