The art of bootmaking

I’m not going to start bootmaking I don’t believe, but it’s a good thing to meander and I enjoyed reading up a little on lasts and heels and oak tanning and pegging. How I got there was via my looking online for where I might buy some boots. My mind took a side road, as usually happens, and I began thinking about the art of bootmaking. I looked it up and there was a forum and articles and old black-and-white photos of master bootmakers at their craft. The terminology was oddly satisfying. Reading about round nails and square nails and how many stitches per inch on a shoe’s sole was satisfying. The terminology was good as a door to secret fairy underworld realms for an individual who as a child knew not to believe that elves slipped into the shops of good cobblers at night leaving in the morning new shoes lined up in a row for their future, lucky, life-time owners, but I believed in them never-the-less. I smelled leather, heard hammers.

I keep writing bookmaking and having to change it.

I wondered at the etymology of the word “cobbler” and looked it up. The etymology seems to be unknown.

I wondered why cobbler is also a word for a bungler, someone who does things wrong.

Seems cobbling together would be to do with the art of laying cobblestones, but what do I know.

This article informs on the grand benefits of custom handmade shoes. If one ever has near the money and is in need of feeling tended, seems like a trip to the shoemaker is the way to go. A good shoemaker will examine your standing foot, your sitting foot, will examine all its bunions and disjointed joints, not with a mind to berating you for your imperfections but accomodating and making them as comfortable as possible.

As I was saying, I’m looking to buy a pair of boots. I only wear work boots (I wouldn’t be adverse to another type of boot though). I prefer lace-to-toe. I want at least 8 inches high. Steel toe or not steel toe? I have a habit of banging and breaking toes and steel toes help prevent that. The last pair of boots I bought was when Clinton was in office. I wear my boots a dedicated long time. It’s unlikely I’ll buy another pair in a while and I’m driving myself nuts examining my online choices.

I’m even looking at a women’s packer boot but don’t know how comfortable they would be as a walking boot. I’ve read they are a comfortable all-purpose boot and have read they are not. No help there and I don’t imagine I’ve ever personally known anyone who put on a packer boot. They’ve been around a while so there must be something to recommend them. I don’t ride horses but because they are lace-up and lighter and tend to ruggedness, I’m looking at them as an option. I’ve seen versions with lug soles and without. What makes them a “packer” boot I don’t know. I tried looking that up as well but didn’t come up with anything specific about their design. Until someone tells me I’m a clueless idiot for considering them, I’ll still wonder about them. My mind’s stuck on it. For about five years I’ve been looking at a pair of Justin’s.

I’ve been thinking about what it was like going through the business of acquiring a pair of hard-soled shoes pre mass-produced footwear days. Wonder what the social status was of good bootmakers. Have wondered about what kind of lives bad bootmakers lived, assuming that every town had its bad bootmakers as well as its good. Cranky feet would make for some awfully irate customers, it seems, and a socially uncomfortable life.

When I purchased my Caterpillars they were black but somewhere along the way the left boot turned dark brown. So I’ve been walking around looking like I’m wearing one black boot and one chocolate brown, like the person who gets up in the morning and puts on different colors of socks. I was at first annoyed. I didn’t like it. I thought one’s shoes should match in color. Then I decided to not let it annoy me. That wearing pied boots might teach me something though what I don’t know. Since society is so glued to the idea of symetrically colored boots, I figured that it wouldn’t be a bad idea to wear pied footwear for a time.

I keep wondering how Leprechauns became associated with cobbling. Someone out there is sure to know. There must be a reason. You don’t have stories of people getting up in the morning to find new scarves, crockery or underwear left by elves.

I’m permitting myself to meditate on these boots a bit, rationalizing that it’s the fault of elves in corner shadows attempting to invite my attention to them or something. I read that Leprechauns only work on a single shoe, never a pair. And I look at that chocolate brown boot.


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3 responses to “The art of bootmaking”

  1. Jim McCulloch Avatar

    When we lived in El Paso, Kay knew the wife, or maybe ex-wife, of one of the Lamas of the Tony Lama boot empire. Tony Lama was an actual cobbler, who began making boots in El Paso around World War One, and became famous, among bootmakers, and wealthy, and by the time he died had built (cobbled?) a giant boot business.
    Later Lamas no longer cobbled. The woman Kay knew was rich, but knew nothing about boots.

  2. The Herettik Avatar

    Um nicely cobbled together, J.

  3. Stephanie Avatar
    Stephanie

    I spent some time working in a shoe shop and just generally being obsessed with footwear. I found out that a cobbler was one who repaired shoes. And to cobble a shoe means to nail the soles on as a opposed to sewing them on.

    A cordwainer builds shoes and boots from scratch.

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