Walk through History

Can you imagine what life was like when shoes weren’t discovered yet?

People would walk barefoot on the streets with bruises on their dirtied feet, fashion is not updated for it will seem like we humans still live in the century where we had only just discovered how to make fire, and high heels for the unfortunate short people will be no more!

Did you ever wonder at all how it all started?

Well, it all began because of a real and practical need to protect our vulnerable feet from outside forces. This seemingly simple human need turned into a quickly evolving industry in which design was just as important as functionality. Although the main qualities of footwear have remained unchanged, looking back at the long and interesting history of shoes, you can see that the colors, materials and designs did change. Before, shoes used to be made by craftsmen. But today, they are part of a factory industry earning huge amounts of money each year.

Sandals were the most common footwear in most early civilizations, however, a few early cultures had shoes. In Mesopotamia, (c. 1600-1200 BC) a type of soft shoes were worn by the mountain people who lived on the border of Iran. The soft shoe was made of wraparound leather, similar to a moccasin. As late as 1850, most shoes were made on absolutely straight lasts, with no difference between the right and the left shoe.

History of Shoe Making Machinery

• Jan Ernst Matzeliger made an automatic method for lasting shoes and made the mass production of affordable shoes possible.

• Lyman Reed Blake developed the sewing machine for sewing the soles of shoes to the uppers. In 1858, he received a patent for his specialized sewing machine.

• Charles Goodyear Jr's Goodyear Welt patented on January 24, 1871 was, a machine invented for sewing boots and shoes.

Shoelaces

• From the Latin word for "needle," an aglet is the small plastic or fiber tube that binds the end of a shoelace to prevent fraying and to allow the lace to be passed through an eyelet or another opening.

• The modern shoestring (string and shoe holes) was first invented in England in 1790 but before shoestrings, shoes were commonly fastened with buckles.

Rubber Heel

• The first rubber heel for shoes was patented on January 24, 1899, by Irish-American Humphrey O'Sullivan. O'Sullivan patented the rubber heel which outlasted the leather heel then in use.

• Elijah McCoy developed an improvement to the rubber heel.

• The first rubber soled shoes called plimsolls were developed and manufactured in the United States in the late 1800s. In 1892, nine small rubber manufacturing companies consolidated to form the U.S. Rubber Company. Among them was the Goodyear Metallic Rubber Shoe Company, organized in the 1840s in Naugatuck, Connecticut. This company was the first licensee of a new manufacturing process called vulcanization, discovered and patented by Charles Goodyear. Vulcanization uses heat to meld rubber to cloth or other rubber components for a sturdier, more permanent bond.

• On January 24, 1899, Humphrey O'Sullivan received the first patent for a rubber heel for shoes.

• From 1892 to 1913, the rubber footwear divisions of U.S. Rubber were manufacturing their products under 30 different brand names. The company consolidated these brands under one name.When choosing a name, the initial favorite was Peds, from the Latin meaning foot, but someone else held that trademark. By 1916, the two final alternatives were ​Veds or Keds, with the stronger sounding Keds being the final choice.​

• Keds were first mass-marketed as canvas-top "sneakers" in 1917. These were the first sneakers. The word "sneaker" was coined by Henry Nelson McKinney, an advertising agent for N. W. Ayer & Son, because the rubber sole made the shoe stealthy or quiet, all other shoes, with the exception of moccasins, made noise when you walked. In 1979, the Stride Rite Corporation acquired the Keds brand.