Name/Title
Cowboy BootsEntry/Object ID
2023.2.85.245Description
Gold Bond cowboy boots were sold by Sears Roebuck & Company. They were made in Texas, and advertised as a high quality boot. Similar boots appeared in various catalogs, including the specialty Western Wear catalog from Sears, since the 1940s.
Some of the Gold Bond boots were less ornate than this example. They may not have the white leather accents, or if they did they may be simpler than this pair. The boots might have a squarer toe as well, which fit well with utilitarian boots.Context
Cowboy boots, and the cowboys who wear them, have long been a part of American culture. The origins of the footwear can be traced well beyond the borders of the United States, though. As David Courtney explains in Texas Monthly, the cowboy boot that came to be in the late nineteenth century (somewhere from 1866-1890) has ties to the fashionable Wellingtons (named after the Duke of Wellington who popularized them) from earlier in the nineteenth century and as far back as the shoes the Mongols and Genghis Khan wore at the turn of the twelfth century.Cataloged By
Erin Bistline
