Chimney sweep brushes up against 40 years in trade

SANDPOINT — For most folks, hitting the 40-year mark in a career puts them at the stage where things are starting to wind down. For chimney sweep Allan Bopp, who started working his trade in Bonner County way back in 1977, it’s just another chance to raise the bar.

“They say it’s good to be a goal-setting person,” said Bopp, standing outside his Sandpoint shop dressed head-to-toe in traditional sweep garb. “One of my goals is to clean a chimney by myself when I turn 100.”

When he first started out, there was only one other chimney sweep in the area. By the 1980s, several other players had come into the field. In 1982, Bopp decided to pursue certification — both because he thought it was an important professional move, but also to set himself apart from the mounting competition.

“In the early years, I kind of learned by myself,” he said. “I didn’t talk to my competitors back then, because everybody was out looking for more business.

“For a good portion of time, I was one of the first certified sweeps in the state and the only one in North Idaho,” he added. “It’s been an interesting progression. Today, trade organizations have become more important and the educational component is much bigger.”

The idea of sweeping chimneys landed in his lap when he realized that something he was already doing out of necessity might be a way to make a living.

“I was cleaning my own chimney when I lived over on the Montana border and I saw an article about the resurgence of chimney sweeps,” Bopp said. “I thought, ‘Gee — maybe I can make a couple of bucks doing that.”

Judging by the number of chimneys he has cared for since the late-1970s — at least 500 per year, by his own estimate — Bopp’s first impression was correct.

Over the course of 40 years in the business, Bopp has seen plenty of changes. For the first several years, he embraced the whole sweep aesthetic, wearing a trademark top hat as he clambered up onto even the most fearsome rooflines to do his work.

“I always wore my top hat, but I finally stopped doing that because, when it was windy, it would blow off and when it was sunny, it was too hot,” he said.

One of the biggest differences between now and 1977 is how the job gets done. Back then, there were a lot of ladders to move and some scary pitches to navigate as he climbed his way up to the chimney.

“In the early years, I had one, 36-foot ladder and I cleaned everything the old-fashioned way — from above,” he said. “Today, I don’t think I could even pick that ladder up without throwing my back out.”

These were times when wood-burning stoves were still fixtures in most Sandpoint homes. As natural gas became readily available and newer homes went up, the “townies” shifted away from that heating source. By the turn of the 21st Century, that transition was all but complete, according to Bopp.

“The major portion of my clientele lives in the country now,” he said. “It’s rare that I work in town anymore.”

Following his certification, Bopp started becoming more involved in the professional side of his trade, eventually serving on the board of directors of the National Chimney Sweep Guild. That post carries him to multiple industry conventions, including a couple in Europe. It was on one of those trips that he met a German sweep who introduced him to new technology coming out of that nation. Instead of having to climb and shimmy, he learned, German sweeps were doing all of their work from underneath.

Today, Bopp cleans in the same, modernized way — using a brush attached to a machine that feeds up the chimney, with drop clothes out and vacuum running.

All of which runs against the image most of us have of chimney sweeps, which happens to be that of Bert and his dancing pals, cavorting on the rooftops of London. In fact, Bert seemed like a soot-covered renaissance man of sorts — he cleaned chimneys, performed as a one-man band, drew masterpieces of sidewalk chalk art and danced along precarious perches in his spare time.

With such high expectations, has Bert been a blessing or a curse for modern-day sweeps?

“Probably more of a blessing,” said Bopp. “Except when people ask me to dance and sing, which I do not do.”

The image of the affable chimney sweep has roots that go back far longer than Walt Disney’s version of the book by P.L. Travers. The tradition of inviting a chimney sweep to your wedding to bless the nuptials might go back as far as 1066, when King William of Britain is said to have been saved by a sweep who pushed him out of the path of a runaway carriage. The king proclaimed chimney sweeps to be bearers of good fortune and invited his sooty champion to his daughter’s wedding to spread some more of it around.

In Germany, it’s still considered good luck to touch the button of a chimney sweep’s coat as you pass.

Then again, there might be some added goodwill for a trade that shares chimneys in their daily work with a jolly old man who pops down a lot of them one special night each year. With his white beard and sparkly eyes, Bopp has found that association to be especially entertaining.

“I had one little girl who looked at me and then asked her mother, “Mommy, is Santa Claus going to clean our chimney?” he said. “I told her, ‘Yep — I come down them and I clean them.”

The Santa connection was also strong with at least one of Bopp’s colleagues on the international front, who always carried a bit of red coat cloth in his pocket. If he showed up at a job where there were small children present, he managed to get it snagged among the bricks inside the family’s chimney and excitedly call them in to share the discovery.

His plan to clean a chimney as a centenarian not withstanding, Bopp does have his eye on planning for retirement sometime in the next few years. Before then, however, he wants to find and train the right person to take up his brushes when he sets them down.

“There are a lot of goofballs out there with a truck and a brush who don’t know anything about fire codes, much less things like draft and air flow,” he said.

“My client file is still on index cards,” he continued. “I’ve been to some of their houses 25 times or more and they’ve become my friends. I don’t want to turn these people over to just anybody — I want somebody who’s honest and conscientious.”

Until then, you’ll find Allan Bopp doing what he has been doing for closing in on 40 years — cleaning chimneys under the name Bald Eagle Chimney Sweep. Who knows? He might even wear that top hat if you ask nicely. Just don’t request a rooftop song and dance.

Information: 208-265-4479