Uniforms Garments: Footwear Types--Leather Shoes
Figure 1.--The boys at this day school did not wear sandals, but black oxfords. They were the everyday schoolwear, not just the footwear for formal occassions.
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Normally the children wore different types of leather shoes and sandals. We note many kinds of leather shoes, both brown and black lace-ups oxfords and slips-ons. No other colors or multi-colored shoes were allowed. The lace up shoes were the most common, but we noted slips-ons at several schools. The schools were more concerned with color than shoe style, but this varied from school to school. Black shoes seem more common than brown, but brown shoes were worn at quite a number of schools. The variation oin shoes was wider for brown shoes than black. Tghere were several casual styles of brown shoes that were not sneakers, but casual styles. Sneakers might be worn for mornuing break and sports, but not for classes. Boys wore shoes for everyday wear at many classess. Quite a number of schools had the boys wear sandals for everyday classes, but when dressing up for special moccassions with white shirt abnd tie, shoes were worn rather than sandals. And with shoes the issue of brushed and polished shoes came up so the shoes looked smart with the uniforms. A routine for shoe care was normally developed in boarding schools. For day schools it was up to the parents to look after. As it rains a good bit in Britain, this was a comtinuing problem. The boys, especially the younger boys, are normally much less concerned about polished shoes than the parents and school authorities.
