Clogs in Britain and Beyond - Michael L Jackson
Channel: The Morris Federation
Date: 2021-10-20

Michael Jackson briefly covers the history of clog making in Britain.  He considers European influences on British clogs, and vice versa, as well as comments of wooden footwear around the world.  Heritage clogs and wooden shoes, and clog-making tools, are used to illustrate the talk, plus photographs and other old pictures.

Michael Jackson grew up in Lancaster, a town where clogs were available from several retail outlets into the 1980s, and they were worn both for work and leisure. He bought his first pair in 1980 when he joined John O’Gaunt Morris Men.  Subsequently he has acquired many more pairs of clogs, and clog-making tools and memorabilia, sometimes as a result of generous donations. The collection includes not only many different examples of British clogs, but also styles of wooden shoes from around the world.

A couple of years ago, a talk in a local museum about clog making led to a piece in a local newspaper (repeated on a number of websites in the North West), which in turn led to an appearance on BBC1’s Bargain Hunt.

Michael can be seen dancing in clogs with Royal Preston Morris Dancers and Horwich Prize Medal Morris Men.  He can be seen dancing in other footwear with Abram Morris Dancers, Medlock Rapper, Regency Rejigged, and Seven Stars Sword and Step Dancers.

Michael will continue to be busy with clog-related research.  He is preparing to re-publish an old history of clog-making in Britain, supplemented by his own research into people and businesses involved in the trade at the end of the nineteenth century.  This will be distributed as a PDF free-of-charge in Facebook groups, in order to reach as many people as possible.

Michael has posted links to hundreds of Google Photos albums of clog-related photographs on the Facebook page of Seven Stars Sword and Step Dancers. The albums include photographs of many different styles of clogs, as well as old postcards and various documents.  See: https://www.facebook.com/7StarsSwordandStep