The Chicago Tattooing & Body Piercing Company: An unofficial history of the oldest shop in town, as told by Nick Colella
By tawnysaurus
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"At the time, it was pretty underground, but Phil Sparrow and Cliff were queer, which was a way underground, closeted type-thing. After '63 and South Street closed, they opened up a new shop on Larrabee Street."
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"They had that shop on Larrabee for a little bit, then Phil Sparrow decided he was gonna go to California and work."
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"Cliff Raven decided to go up to Milwaukee with a tattooer named Tatts Thomas, this famous tattooer. They went to go work with another famous tattooer up in Milwaukee, Amund Dietzel. Cliff still had the Larrabee shop, and he'd go back and forth between Chicago and Milwaukee."
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"So, in about '67, they [Raven, Thomas] came back down to Chicago."
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"Buddy McFall was a little older, and had worked at South State Street with Tatts and those guys, and he was just, like, an old carny. They worked together at the shop at 900 Belmont, and they were still the only shop in the city at the time."
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"I don't know how much tattooing Tatts did there. I mean, he was pretty old. No one really knows too much about him. Supposedly he died around 1970 or so, but I talked to his granddaughter, and she doesn't even know. Anyway, he was tattooing on South State Street in the early 20s, like in the teens. So when he died, he had this kind of legacy of tattooing that was left to Cliff."
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"In '72, Dale shows up, and Cliff and Buddy teach him how to tattoo."
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"In 1973, they decide to start making tattoo machines, and starting a small supply business."
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"Eventually, they switched shares of shops, Cliff got Dale and Buddy's Sunset shares, and they got his Chicago shares. Then in about '77, Cliff moved full time to California. At that time, no one was doing the type of work Cliff was doing. He was doing these massive, like, Japanese-inspired body suits and stuff like that. No one in the Midwest was doing that. Don Nolan and Ed Hardy were the only other ones, and they were out west."
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"1977, Buddy retires, and it's just Dale and whatever yahoo he can get to work over there by him."
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"Dale moves to 922 Belmont. So now, it's Dale and a couple other people, I don't really know their names, and they coast for a while."
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"Dave still works here. He's been here for, it's been about 25 years. Then there's just a cavalcade of yahoos that follow him, for the most part."
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"In '86, they thought maybe Cliff was gonna come back, and Dale really wanted him to come back, supposedly, but he doesn't come back."
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"By when Nick (artist, manager) comes in, by the time my illustrious career begins, in '94 there are six shops in Chicago Now there's like, I don't even know how many. Countless. "
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When Cliff Raven died, he was residing in 29 Palms, CA, where he ran a rare/used bookstore called Raven's Books.
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Current location, 1017 W. Belmont.
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After a long period of contention, letter writing, and a Blagojevich veto, the age requirement to get a tattoo in Illinois goes back to 18 years.
