"A History of Shoes" Pics

We had a great time this weekend with our "A History of Shoes" exhibit. We had lots of compliments from folks that came through. We even had a couple of pairs of the very first Hush Puppies ever made. You can see them in the photo above. Our rep. even let us borrow a travel case that, back in the day, the reps took door to door when they sold the shoes. It had a bottle of dirt that they would put on leather samples to show how well the leather could be cleaned. Very fun!

One of our customers let us borrow a pair of vintage boots that she owned from the 20's. They were absolutely beautiful. Only problem is that they didn't have zippers - those weren't invented until later : ) So if you wanted to wear them, you had to lace them all the way up. Oh My!!

Our very good friend, Jorge Campos, who owns Sandy & Vale's shoe repair downtown, let us borrow a few of the shoes that he had handmade. They were amazing! He would like to do more of this type of work but he doesn't have the equipment to do it. He left his sewing machine in El Salvador when he left and the cost of a new one is about $1000. We are going to help him try to find a used one. We thought about having a fund raiser to help him raise enough money to buy the machine. He is so talented and I personally would love to have a pair of shoes made by him!

Our RMSA rep, Randy Irving, let us borrow some shoe lasts that his father had. Randy's father was a shoe designer in the 60's. The shoes that he designed were incredible and Randy said they would have sold for $20 a pair. Of course the samples were a size 4, my big old foot would never fit into that. Too bad - loved them!!!