Figure 1.--Here is a page from the 1906 Sears catalog offering children's shoes . There were both high-tops and oxfords offered as well as a strap shoe in black patent or white kid.
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Figure 1.--Here is a page from the 1906 Sears catalog offering children's shoes . There were both high-tops and oxfords offered as well as a strap shoe in black patent or white kid. |
Sears offered quite a range of footwear. The styles are mostly high tops with some oxfords. There were no closed toe t-strap sandals in either the adult or children shoe pages. This would seem to indicate that they weren't yet mass produced. So far, 1910 is the earliest ads I have found for this style, although we are still looking. We note strap shoes which Sears calls "strap sandals".
The Sears, Roebuck and Co., huge merchandising firm centered in Chicago was founded by Richard W. Sears (1863-1914) and A.C. Roebuck (1864-1948). Sears had begun a career in mail-order business in Minnesota 1886. In Chicago he and Roebuck joined resources and formed a corporation in 1893 as a mail-order business under title Sears, Roebuck and Company. Julius Rosenwald (1862-1932) in 1895 bought Roebuck's interest in firm and became president on Sears's retirement 1908. A retail-store system was added 1925. The first foreign store added in Havana, Cuba during 1945 and becane te first expropriated store in 1960. The Sears-Roebuck brought the production of industry to the fartherest corner of rural America, opening the cornucopia of the consumer age to rural America. All the new things that were changing American life danced across their pages. Through it, a huge Chicago warehouse offers to modernize the farms and small towns of the Midwest.
Here is a page offering children's shoes (figure 1).
The styles are mostly high tops with some oxfords.
There were no closed toe t-strap sandals in either the adult or children shoe pages. This would seem to indicate that they weren't yet mass produced. So far, 1910 is the earliest ads I have found for this style, although we are still looking.
We note strap shoes which Sears calls "strap sandals". The ad copy reads, "Misses" and Children's Strap Sandals, $0.85 and $0.75. We herewith illustrate our misses Misses' and Child's Dongols Strap Sandal, made over a medium last with fancy patent leather tip; suitable for street or dress wear. This sandal is genuine McKay sewed, and will give splendid service. Width full. Weight averages 14 ounces. No. 15E460 Misses' sizes 11 1/2 to 2
Price per pair.........................................$0.85
No. 15E462 Children's sizes 8 to 11
Price per pair.........................................$0.75
No. 15E463 Infant's sizes 5 to 8
Price per pair.........................................$0.65." I think this is the first reference I have seen as "strap" shoe,
although it is also called a "sandal". It appears to have been tied with a ribbon. Buckles seem to have appeared later. I'm not sure what "Dongols" meant. There were also two other strap sandals, one done in black and the other in white. All these strap sandals were dress shoes. The term dandal at the time did not have the modern connotation of a casual shoe.
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