got twinkle?

The strips of copper across the toes were so glittering that Laura wished she wrer a boy. Little girls didn't wear copper-toes. -Little House in the Big Woods, Chapter 10, "Summertime"

Except of course, little girls did wear copper-toes. There were quite the lawsuits going on in the late 1850s, before events in Little House in the Big Woods took place, between rival "inventors" of metal toe protectors for shoes: the National Shoe Protector Company and the American Shoe Tip Company.

Patent documents state: "In providing the upper on the toes of boots and shoes with fenders of copper, brass, India-rubber, gutta-percha, or any other substance, for the purpose of protecting against grasses, etc., cutting or wearing out the uppers on the toes of boots and shoes, which fencer is required to be made so as to fit upon the toe, previous to putting on the outsole, and to extend beneath the outsole far enough to receive the pegs, which are to fasten it on, etc."

In addition to Clarence Huleatt's copper toe protector, his shoes probably had wire-quilted soles.

In September, 1863, the American Shoe Tip Company reported the following "Improvements in the manufacture of boot and shoe toe pieces or tips and in the machinery or apparatus employed therein." The framework consists of a platform and two uprights thereon united near or at their tops by a cross-piece. A block secured to the uprights supports a die holder, which is a quadrangular cast-iron casing open at top and having through each side an adjusting screw. A plunger slides freely up and down on ways along the uprights, and to it is adjusted by means of a dovetail joint and ledge a follower, whose lower end is shaped in accordance with the interior of the tip to be made. The die is a solid metal casting; its cavity is shaped to conform with the outside of the tip and is so disposed that both sides correspond to the underside thereof. The top of the die should be bevelled forming an angle with the plane of motion of the follower of about 40 degrees. Upon the face of the die is fixed by screws a gauge to hold the metal blank in position. The gauge is "a plate having a slot cut through it of such a shape as to fit nicely the convex side of the tip blank; it is so adjusted that the part which is to form the portion of the tip that extends over the toe of the show oer boot shall lap over and extend beyond the cavity in the die. if the machine is worked by hand, a handle is connected to the plunger. When the plunger is raised to a convenient height, the handle is held wedged in a tapering slot while the blank is being fitted into the gauge.

Labels: laura ingalls wilder

- posted by pioneergirl at 2:24 PM