Arizona weekly journal-miner., 1895-02-06
THE MAINE MoccAsIN.
By No Means Handsome. but Esteemed hV
 Lumbermsn East and West.

By No Means Handsome, but Estesmsd kv
 Lumbermun East and West.
 Everybody who has been in Maine during the winter among the lumber men and backwoods farmers knows the blown up looking muddy yellow boots and shoes these useful and pic turesQue citizens wear, said a vet eran leather dealer in the swamp. ''They call 'em moccasins The first pair was made by & shoemaker in Bangor, and their fame long ago spread to the west. The shoe factO- ries of Bangor now turn out annually something like loo. 900 pairs of moo casin boots and one-quarter as many shoes. and there are factories out in Minnesota and Wisconsin that make almost as many.
 A person on first seeing this yel- low and baggy footwear would sup pose that it was made from some strange leather, but it isn't. The material is just common leather, but leather tanned in a way that is known to only a few. All we know is thak salt, alum and some kind of an out of the way oil are the principal Agen- ciee that give the leather its peculiar color and fexibility. This leather had been made years and years be- fore any one thought of using it for boots or shoes. The only use to which it was put up to 1851 was to make lacings for mill belts. It was made only at Pawtucket. One day a man named Baldwin. who was a shoe maker in Bangor, made up his mind that the leather was just the thing for winter moccasins. and he made 6 few pairs. They were tried by hum bermen, and Baldwin proved to bs right. Nothing had ever been offer. cd to the Maine lumbermen that fill ed the bill like Bsldwin's yellow moccaSins, and in less than 6 year a big factory for turning out these queer boots and shoes was started in Bangor Other factories sprang up in Maine, and the tanning of the belt lace leather made those who knew the secret of it rich in a short time and compelled the increasing of tanning capacity tenfold.
 Until 1871 the boots and shoes were made just as Baldwin made his first pair % years before. Then ms chimes forcutting and fashioning ths moccasins came into use and Fevolu- tionized tho business. In 1858, the fame of the Maine moccasin having reached the far western lumber re- gions, a Bangor firm received ak or. der for pair from some one in Du- buque. The orier was filled, and this led to other orders, until, when the war broke out, the eastern fAc tories were shipping thousands of pairs of Maine mOccasins to the west The war almost killed the business. It began to revive soon after the war, and then rival factories sprang up in the west, and now the great demands for this Maine footgear from the lumber regions of the northwest are now almost entirely filled by facto- tories at St. Paul, Racine, Minneapo- hs and other points.
 The value of the moccasin lies ai- most entirely in the peculiar way tn which the leather is tanned. The tanning renders the leather absolute ly waterproof and a perfect noncon- ductor of heat and cold The coiog of tho moccasin is a golden yellow, and fashion has made them in the shape of shoes as popular in the town these days, especially in the summer. as they are in the wilder ness where the snow is thigh deep" New York Sun