The Bridgeport times and evening farmer., 1919-12-02
WOOD REPLACES
 LEATHER HEELI. IN
 MOMENTS SHOES

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 New York Dec. 2.-The word Rhoes naturally brings to mind leather but there are made nowadays great. numbers of women's slippers, pumps and shoes designed for house and for dress wear that are made with up pers silk. satin, velvet and cloth, as well as Of kid. calf and fine feathers, and which have wooden -SeeIs.
 These wooden heels cost less to make than leather IoeIs. but they ire put on the finest as well as the less expensive shO... because they are lighter than leather heels of the same size. because In the tall. slender shapes and especially in the high, narrow necked French heels. they stand up better under weight, and be- cause. being rigid, the cover. ng on them remains smooth and perfect.
 These wooden heels are made Of hard maple. First block is arc0ved being put in a machine that cuts in that part of 1t that faces the sole of the shoe under the insrep. the little tncurving sweep that gives the heel grace there. and then the block goes
 
 into heel shape
 The knives in this machine work rapidly and smoothly, and as the heel comes out it may seem perfectly smooth and finished and ready to be covered, as it is if the material to be used in the covering is comparatively thick, but if the heel has an extension in front under the instep it goes to a securing machine co be finished on that extending part, and if it is to be covered with silk or satin, vex thin material, the entire heel is pslished on a buffer to a perfect silky smooth ness. The heel is bored and plugged to reinforce and strengthen it, and then, finished in the wood, is ready to be covered.
 Many Shades Popular.
 Many materials are used in cover ing wooden heels, and they may be used in almost endless variety of col Ors or shades. Some shoe manufact- urers buy their own wooden heels and cover them in their own factories: some have wooden heel manufi = urers cover and finish the heels com pletely, sending the covering materials cut or not cut, as the case may be, and receiving from them heels ready to go on the shoes. And wooden heels are commonly made to order, for they are required of many shapes with the fashions always changing.
 The coverings are cut out by hand, though they are knife cut, many at a time, but each cover must be stretched or glued to each heel by hand. Then there is glued into tho groove Cf the heel, com pletely covering that sur face, a piece of split leather of pre- ciseIy the color and also of the same style of finish as that of the bottom of the shoe which the groove faces, and now there Is nailed to the bot tom of the heel a thickness of leather like a layer on any heel.
 The 1eathcr protects the wood from wear, kills the sound that the wood would otherwise make in walking, and also protects the lower edge.
 How Nails Are Put On.
 The trim little semi-circIes of tiny brass nails that ar seen in the heels are really pieces Of brass wire, sec lions from a coil of wire carried on a machine which thrusts the end of the wire through the leather, and into the wood. It then cuts off the wire and drives the next nail in the same man. ner. and so around.
 Then the heel goes to a trimming machine. The leather may project a trifle beyond the heels covering. It must be made so that it's edge sur face is absolutely smooth and flush with the covering. This is done in the trimming machine, and then the edge of the leather IS colored as leather edges commonly are, usually either red, Ieath CT coIored or black.
 Millions Used Yearly.
 The heel next proceeds to a buffer on which the bottom of the leather is smoothed and polished. Then it may be colored artificiaIIy, or if it is not to be coIored the bottom of the leather may be finished with vel vet finish. The finish, whatever it may be, is made tC be in accordance with the finish of the sole of the shoe on which 1t is to go, and with the final finishing of the leather the heel is completed
 Through the latter process the heel has been banded with it's covering or and this may be Of some delicate ma teriaI or color. So now they are in- spected and finally packed in cartons a dozen pairs of heels to the box, ana are ready for the shoe manufa cturer
 It is stated that 25 per cent of the women's shoes worn In this countrS are now made with wooden heels. O which there are produced millions ot pairs annually.