It is the loveliest piece of public art you could hope to see: a barber's pole with a dog doing what dogs do on poles.
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It's on the wall outside the post office in O'Connor but the shop used to be a barber's. Over the years, the mural has faded a little but it remains noticeable and beloved by passers-by. Local people fear for its future.
Some wondered if it was by the acclaimed mural artist Banksy. It's certainly in his style.
And it may be - but hardly likely (Banksy's agent has been approached for confirmation either way).
It's more likely to have been painted by - or at least commissioned by - the barber of the time, a man known in the area these days only as Les.
But Les is a legend.
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He retired some years ago, leaving a host of fond memories.
According to legend, a customer once died in the barber's chair but he finished off the next customer's haircut before shutting shop.
"Oh God, he's gone and died," Les is reputed to have said.
It may be true.
"He was from another era," former customer Markus Mannheim (now of the ABC) wrote.
"His Spartan store was devoid of adornments, except for the calendar and photos of topless women on the walls. He always wore a khaki safari suit.
"Men, especially poorer ones, used to form large queues at Les' shop, sometimes stretching well past the door. When he last cut my hair, just before he retired, I paid $9 like I always did."
Les was a man of few words, according to Ken Waring, who now runs the post office but used to be customer. "He used to do three or four haircuts in an hour."
Before moving into the downstairs shop, Les had the shop above, according to former customer Axel Axelsen. Then, what was euphemistically called a "gentleman's club" moved there and Les moved downstairs.
He was an old-fashioned barber, with pots of sanitising liquids to keep combs clean. If he wasn't wearing a khaki safari suit, he wore a white coat (accounts differ; memories play tricks).
And he had a homemade wooden contraption for "flat top" haircuts (where the hair on the top of the head stands up straight, possibly with the aid of gel, and sometimes with a mullet at the back).
Mr Axelsen remembers the contraption as made of wood to go round the head, with a grill at the top so that the hair would stick out for Les to put the blade over it. "Flat top" haircuts were popular in the early 60s, particularly with astronauts and other clean-living specimens of American manhood (though German generals also had them more than a century ago).
Either way, Les is still remembered with affection. "There was always a queue of old blokes and young guys waiting for a flat top," Mr Axelsen recalls.
"He also did shaves with a straight razor but I never went back for another."
Les' prices are also missed. He charged $9 before he retired even when other barbers were charging $12. One customer is reputed to have urged him to raise his prices.
He is missed - but the artwork he created or commissioned remains.
Maybe the ACT government should find a way of ordering its preservation in perpetuity. If it's good enough for Banksy, it's good enough for Les.
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Steve Evans
Steve Evans is a reporter on The Canberra Times. He's been a BBC correspondent in New York, London, Berlin and Seoul and the sole reporter/photographer/paper deliverer on The Glen Innes Examiner in country New South Wales. "All the jobs have been fascinating - and so it continues."
Steve Evans is a reporter on The Canberra Times. He's been a BBC correspondent in New York, London, Berlin and Seoul and the sole reporter/photographer/paper deliverer on The Glen Innes Examiner in country New South Wales. "All the jobs have been fascinating - and so it continues."
