The eyes are the windows to the soul, but David Coleman puts his heart and soul into windows for the sake of everyone’s eyes.
“I’m just trying to give people a brighter outlook,” he quips, “let them see who’s looking in. Sometimes that leads to interesting stories.”
David Coleman’s been washing windows for 53 years — he took up the trade as a teenager in Iowa and continued it for decades after moving to Texas and training his family members in the task. (Top) David Coleman spreads a generous amount of suds on a downtown window Dec. 27, making the rounds along with his wife, Joyce, and friend, Bruce Danner, during the local rotation for Coleman Window Service.
As a high school senior in Iowa back in 1972, Coleman took up the sponge and squeegee for the first time, got to work and the rest is history – literally, since ‘window washing’ as a job dates back 2,000 years, give or take, with archaeological evidence of glass panes at Roman villas.
“I knew someone who had been doing this, so I started doing it in winter break up in Iowa,” says the long-time proprietor of Coleman Window Service. David remembers cleaning windows in weather 28-below before migrating south: “I came to Texas in ‘74, went to school for about a year and half, then got back to this.
“I taught my wife how to do it when we got married in 1975. Now it’s the two of us and a friend of ours… I taught both my girls how to do it growing up, but neither one do it now.”
Today’s trio – David and Joyce Coleman along with Bruce Danner – was out and about downtown Friday afternoon, making their regular rounds.
“We do a fair amount in Gladewater,” David says. There’s enough clients keeping them busy throughout the area that he doesn’t have an exact number off the top of his head: “Some in Longview, Big Sandy, a bit in Gilmer, Pittsburg, Mount Pleasant, Kilgore. We do all four Burger Kings in Longview every two weeks.”
How many square feet of glass is that in a typical rotation? Hard to say, but it’s plenty.
“I never tried to figure it out.”
He keeps the cost as fair as possible. One window washing gig might be just $3.25 a pop. Another, more extensive inside/outside cleaning may run more than $100 on a regular basis.
That said, “We haven’t raised our prices like a lot of people do,” garnering praise from long-time customers.
With his bushy white beard, David hears the occasional joke about being ‘Santa in off-season,’ and he grins at the comparison. He’s not one to don the red suit, though — he once favored bib overalls for the pockets and tool loops, but the veteran window washer’s signature attire nowadays is gear from Duluth Trading Company, almost head to toe.
“Basically everything I have on with the exception of this black T-shirt,” he says. “You pay a little more for them, but they seem to hold up.”
The equipment’s evolved a bit in the past half-century, but the traditional sponges and towels do the job for David.
“Back when I started, I used a brush. They’ve changed the style of squeegees some, but I still use the old-fashioned one,” he says.
Coleman, and his crew, can make quick work of a pane of glass when all the corners are in easy reach.
“I’m not as fast as I used to be,” he says, “I’m slowing down a bit. It’s not as easy going up and down the ladders as it used to be.”
David’s spry enough, though, and wastes little time before moving on to the next window.
- By James Draper