Ed Stackhouse prospects for gold in North Carolina.
It was during an Independence Day celebration on July 4 this year that Ed Stackhouse, owner of 33’s Barber Shop in Hamilton Square, accidentally stepped into a fire pit, suffering serious burns on his right foot.
For many people, an injury like that would be a major problem, but the tireless Stackhouse, who continued to cut hair and run the shop while his foot healed, turned it into a positive.
He used his injury to help promote 33’s annual drive collecting tabs from soda cans to raise money for Shriners Hospitals For Children, which provides care to badly burned children at little or no cost to their families. By the time the drive ended on August 22, 33’s had collected tens of thousands of tabs to donate to the cause.
For Stackhouse, this wasn’t just a one-time philanthropic endeavor—it’s emblematic of the ongoing charitable work that the barber shop does in an effort to give back to the community. For example, 33’s has just kicked off it’s fall fundraiser—offering a newspaper coupon for a $12 hair cut, $6 of which will be donated to one of a number of local organizations.
These types of activities are a reason that Stackhouse was honored in April by Hamilton Elks Lodge 2262 with its annual Citizen Of the Year award. Stackhouse choked back tears as he talked about the award and what it means to him.
“When I was younger, my father would look in the newspaper and point out an article about the award and say, ‘Here he is! It’s the Man of the Year!’ I always thought that someday maybe I could be Man of the Year. And this year it happened.”
Stackhouse said he’s always been a community-oriented businessman, and he’s looking to do the same with a new barber shop that he recently opened in North Carolina—33 NC Haircutters. For the past year and a half, Stackhouse has been travelling back and forth between Hamilton and the town of Biscoe, in Stanly County, building his new business there. Currently, he travels 533 miles one way every other week to run the North Carolina shop.
While he’s gone, Stackhouse leaves the job of running to the business to his wife, Liz, and his employees.
“I wouldn’t be able to do this if it wasn’t for my wife and the people who I have working here,” he said. “We have 12 employees, and without them I wouldn’t be able to go back and forth to North Carolina. They say, ‘behind every man there’s a great woman,’ well I’ve got 12 great women behind me at this shop.”
He does joke, though, that it takes the combined efforts of all of them to do his job.
“I’m always on the go,” he said. “I’ve got ADD, hyperactivity, dyslexia. All that good stuff is wrapped up in this one big package.”
And not only is Stackhouse concentrating a lot of that energy into the new business, he’s also using it to pursue another endeavor down south—prospecting for gold.
Stackhouse said he saw a television show where he learned that the herb ginseng is called “North Carolina gold.” Since his sister lives in North Carolina and owns property down there, Stackhouse decided to go down and look for ginseng, with the hopes of making some money off it.
He was doing research online, when he found the story of a boy who found a 17-pound gold nugget on the Reed Farm in North Carolina in 1799 while he was fishing before church one Sunday morning. It was one of the first documented gold finds in U.S. history. The story sparked a touch of gold fever in Stackhouse.
“I looked on a map, and—bam!—there were gold mines all over the area where I was at,” said Stackhouse, adding that in the area where he’s planning to move in North Carolina, geologists in 2011 did a survey and determined that a very small amount—less than 5 percent—of the gold has been found and mined in that area.
That’s when he came up with the plan to open the North Carolina shop and do a bit of prospecting in his free time. As for his strategy for finding gold?
“Number one, I prospect in my barber shop down there,” Stackhouse said. “The best way to find out things and where to go is to talk to the customers.”
One man told him about a piece of property off of the aptly named Gold Mine Road where he “knew” there was gold.
“I was like, ‘What!? Gold Mine Road!? I gotta go there’,” he said.
He went out into the woods there, dug a hole in the side of a creek and found some gold. That was a lucky find, though, as Stackhouse said he has dug hundreds of holes and tested tons of dirt in his search.
The work showed some promise—in total they found about 80 specks of gold, but it was a difficult environment to work in. There were bugs, poison ivy and snakes. There was also a close call with another of the woods’ more dangerous denizens.
“While digging for gold near a creek, we heard a rustling noise coming from nearby,” he said. “We looked around and spotted a tree that was full of claw marks, and my nephew goes, ‘This is where a bear lives!”
Stackhouse, who plans on going back down to the area to prospect in the fall, “after the snakes and bears go to sleep,” said videos and images of his exploits can be found on Facebook and Instagram under the name “Ed the Farmer.”
Eventually, he plans on moving to North Carolina with Liz for good, in a few years after his youngest daughter, who attends Steinert High School, graduates.
“We want to get our own piece of land,” he said. “Go after our dream of being out there in the hills. I always tell Liz that we’re going to run away to live in the mountains someday.”
When he finally does settle down there, Stackhouse plans on running a campaign for election to the U.S. Senate, similar to the independent run he made in New Jersey in the 2013 special election for the seat vacated when Sen. Frank Lautenberg died.
“I did something that no other independent ever did,” he said, looking back on the campaign with some pride. “And that was get votes in every county in New Jersey.”
He pointed out that when he runs in North Carolina—in about four years—it will be in the 33rd Congressional District.
“How crazy is that for cosmic fate?” he asked.
For now, Stackhouse has started planting some political seeds and getting involved in the community. He joined some civic organizations there, like the Lions Club, and started trying to help people out.
“The county that we’re going to is one of the poorest counties in North Carolina and whatever we can do to help people will go a really long way,” he said.
Meanwhile, Stackhouse has been working in barber shops on Route 33 for more than 25 years, and he doesn’t plan on leaving his business behind there any time soon. After he moves to North Carolina, he intends on coming back and working in the Hamilton shop for at least one week a month to pay bills, conduct business and coordinate charitable activities.
He also dispels a recent rumor that he has sold the barber shop and agreed to continue working there for a time as part of the agreement. In fact, right now he’s quite content with the way his life is going.
“I’m living the dream and doing things I never could have imagined,” he said.
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