Shoelaces and aglets – what in the world is going on there?

So there I was the other day with a shoelace that was coming apart. I was somewhat disappointed because these shoes were only five years old. 5 years and the laces give out, what kind of shoe is that, they were obviously using substandard laces. I cannot ever remember buying and replacing shoe laces, I am sure I must have done it at some point in my life but for the life of me I cannot remember when. I spoke to other folks who felt the same way. Others said you must buy good shoes that they outlast the laces. I got to thinking and this pair of shoes in over 5 years old, is that a long time to have a pair of shoes? I have a pair of boots I bought when Bride and I were just dating, 20 some years ago and those have the original laces in them as well with little to no wear on them. I guess I am unsure of any trends in this area, how long do the laces last, how long do shoes last, what is the average tension that laces are pulled to? All good questions but I am digressing a bit.

Probably more information than is needed for this oratory but there it is anyway. So I asked some coworkers about it and they tell me they are everywhere, Walmart, Walgreens, CVS, Publix and Winn Dixie. Anywhere you can buy a can of shoe polish, AH I thought I know about that as my shoes are leather and require regular maintenance and regular polishing. So they tell me they are sold in a couple of ways, in length, in inches or millimeters or by the number of holes in the shoe, for example mine have 4 holes on left side of the tongue and four holes in the right side of the tongue. So on my way home I stopped at Walgreens and went to where the shoe polish is sold and low and behold, there were the shoe laces. There were all manner of laces, some sold by the number of holes and some by length. There were inexpensive thin ones and then there were some a little thicker. The thick ones I suspect had a cord center with a woven outer sheath, like the ones that I was replacing.

Since I had taken one out and measured before arriving at the store I felt I was ready, no joy on that. My laces were measured at 33.375 inches and to my dismay, there were no replacements that measured 33.375 inches for sale on this rack. There were, however, some that measured in at 36 inches even and since I had always felt the laces were a touch short I grabbed a pair of 36 inch black ones and a pair of 36 inch brown ones and started for the counter. Perfect I thought, then a thought why not go get two pairs of each, that way I have standby pairs ready in the event of some weird unforeseen lace catastrophe, it could happen. I did not have an expectation that these replacements would last as long as the originals, replacement things rarely do, so I grabbed a primary and backup pair in each color and off I went. The moment I got home I re-laced both pairs of shoes and placed the spares in the shoe shine kit. As I was doing that, I realized the ridiculousness of buying a spare pair. If in the 45 years I have been bumbling through life I have never bought a replacement pair that I can remember why in the world would I buy a second spare pair? That is just my nature and I will most likely expound on that in another oratory.

New, slightly longer, laces installed and looking and feeling right I was happy. While I was looking at them I remembered a shoelace incident in boot camp that made me laugh. I had laced my Boon Dockers (that is what they called our boots) with that first lace draped over the eyelets and our drill instructor read me the riot act, the Navy does not go over bridges, we go under. I had to re-lace them, and many others quickly followed suite. That got me to wondering about shoe laces in general. Where did they comes from, who invented them, what are they made of and what are those little plastic things on the ends, all good question I remember thinking.

I found that the shoelace was invented in 1790 by Harvey Kennedy. I hear tell that there are some sources who say this is erroneous and the true inventor is unknown. It is, I found, a fact that prior to 1790, there were no shoelaces and after 1790, Harvey Kennedy made nearly two and-a-half million dollars (nearly a fifty billion dollars in today’s money) from the patent on his simple leather strands. Two and half million dollars - in 1790 dollars, on shoelaces – whodathunkit? Those first shoelaces were difficult at best to use though, they were simply a strand and had to be forced through the eyeholes of the shoe. That is until another unknown came up with the aglet, the little piece of plastic on each end of a shoelace. They were first introduced in 1791 and the first ones were of stone, or tin. If you were of the upper crust your aglets may have been silver or gold. It was not until the turn of the 20th century that plastic aglets were popularized, the world never walked the same again. As far as aglets go, they were functional, period. Now if you had aiguillettes they were of course more decorative then functional.

In the course of my investigation on shoelaces I also found there are literally countless way to tie a knot in them. From Bow knots to reef knots to granny knots they are all acceptable in tying shoe laces, here I thought everyone tied them the same way. Another thing I found was there are even more ways to lace them up – who knew? Me, I am under on the first one and then right over left all the way up so they are nice and symmetrical. Something as simple as lacing and tying ones shoes, whodathunkit it could be so complicated? Well if you need new laces, you can go and buy them, or replace the shoes, or we could revolt and stop wearing them altogether. If you must tie em up, just don’t make them too tight!