my Red Wings

I recently purchased a new pair of Red Wing old school work boots. Every year I would get my J-crew winter catalog and wonder if i should follow my dads footsteps. My dad is a mason and a carpenter. He loved quality workgoods. I still have the first hammer he gave me when I was 12. His work uniform was a wonderful raw pair of Lee dungarees or Levi's,a nice cow hide belt or braces, and a lovely old chambrey shirt! My first trip to the states, my dad gave me a pair of boat boots from the timberland company for a casual day, a pair of Red wing boots for work,

(timberlad boat shoe
)and raw selvage Levi's

and his old chambrey shirt. Well i kinda took it, I am rambling.

Back to these Red Wing boots, the quality is too good to be true. I tried to break them in by doing extra hard work while wearing them and they still look good. I think im going to bury them LOL

The company has such a nice history, like Levi's, it paralleled the United States history. So I did some history blogging, google searching, and I found this out about them.












In 1905, German immigrant “Shoe Man” Charles Beckman had been selling shoes at his retail store in the beautiful historic river town of Red Wing, Minnesota for 22 years. Too often, to his frustration, he did not have the right size or type shoe for his customers. It was that frustration and a drive to do more that led to the founding of Red Wing Shoe Company. At first he tailored the shoe lines to meet the lifestyles of specific customer groups such as farmers and railroaders. Within 10 years, the company had branched out producing more than 200,000 pairs of boots per year, and even issued the standard footwear to soldiers fighting in World War I.

Until the 1970s, Red Wing's reputation rested primarily on a wide variety of footwear marketed as “"work shoes” emphasizing their practical use in the workplace. By the mid 1980s, however, as U.S. workers moved increasingly out of industrial and agricultural sectors into service related jobs, the company's scope changed. Their emphasis shifted from “work shoes” to “shoes for work” promoting the company's new commitment to innovative lines of lighter, more comfortable footwear developed to accommodate new work-oriented and recreational needs. New management style and brand image also brought new products to Red Wing giving special attention to women's comfort footwear. Red Wing also ran a series of print advertisements featuring a top model in McCall's, Women's Day, and Mademoiselle magazines and promoting the image of an up-to-date, attractive, and fashionable Red Wing clientele.