My mention of the shoe tree that I saw a couple of days ago sparked a number of emails. I thought I would post a followup with some additional information about shoe trees.

Don’t get me wrong. I’m no expert on shoe trees. Well, I’ve seen two of them during The Dream Tour, so maybe that does make me an expert, I’m not sure. In any case, here’s what I know.

As near as I can tell, shoe trees don’t have any deep, philosophical, metaphysical or religious meaning. Each shoe tree seems to have it’s own reason for being and legend. Perhaps that’s why they’re so interesting — each one is unique.

With regard to the shoe tree at Middlegate, Nevada, it supposedly started with a newlywed couple that camped under the tree. They had an argument and when the woman threatened to walk away, the man said “If you do, you’ll have to walk barefoot,” and threw her shoes in the tree. The man then took the car and went to the one and only bar in Middlegate (yes, it’s that small) where the bartender eventually talked the man out of leaving his new wife. A year later, they came back to Middlegate, brought their first child’s shoes with them, and tossed them into the tree. Since then, people have been adding all kinds of shoes to the tree.

The web site roadsideamerica.com has most of the information I could find on shoe trees:

• Shoe Trees
• Shoe Tree Rules
• Shoe Tree Sightings

There’s also a story about shoe trees on a web site called Road Trip America:

• Shoe Trees–Icons of the American Road

Wikipedia.org, the free, online encyclopedia, has an entry on shoe trees:

• Shoe Tree (roadside attraction)

Possibly related to the idea of shoe trees is the practice of shoe tossing or shoe flinging. That is, the practice of tying two shoes, usually sneakers of some kind, together by their laces and then tossing the whole assembled package over a telephone or powerline so that one sneaker hangs on each side of the wire. I found a number of references to this and related activities:

• Shoe tossing (onto powerlines and the like. Includes a discussion of possible meanings of this practice.)
• The Secret Language of Sneakers (at snopes.com, a site dedicated to urban legends)
• Shoe flinging
• Why do you see pairs of shoes hanging by the laces from power lines? (at www.thestraightdope.com)
• Competitive boot throwing
• Children’s game of shoe flinging

Finally, a possible distant relative to shoe trees is the Cardrona Bra Fence in New Zealand. Interesting.

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