Year: 1888

page_text: Date of Application; 28th Jan., 1888
Specification Accepted, 2nd Mar.. 1888
I, ANDREW FRANKLIN FOANS of 214 East 13th Street in the City of New York,
United States of America, Gentleman, do hereby declare the nature of this invention
and in what manner the same is to be performed, to be particularly described and
ascertained in and by the following statement :-
My Invention consists of an invisible shoe lacing wherein two sets of lacing eyes
are used, one set being attached to the body of the boot or shoe and the other set
secured to the under surface of the fly..
The Invention also consists in combining with the eyes on the under surface of
the fly, imitation buttons which may be removed from the shanks of the eyes, so
that interchangeable buttons may be used for diversifying the ornamentation of
the shoe.
Reference is to be had to the accompanying drawings, forming a part of this
specification, in which figure 1 is a perspective view of a boot laced in accordance
with my invention and figure 2 is an enlarged sectional elevation of a part of the
fly, shewing the construction of the combined imitation button and eye shank.
Similar letters of reference indicate corresponding parts in both the figures.
The body A of the boot is provided at suitable intervals with the loops or eyes a a
and the fly B is provided upon its under surface with the series of eyes bb to
correspond with the eyes a a. One end of the lacing cord C is secured to the
lowermost eye a of the body of the shoe, as shewn in figure 1, and the cord is then
passed through the adjacent eye b and then through an eye a and then through all of
In this manner,
the eyes alternating the eyes a and b as illustrated in said figure 1.
by simply drawing upon the lacing cord the fly will be drawn close to the body A
and held and the lacing cord will be entirely invisible except at the top of the boot.
For securing the lacing cord, I provide the body A with the plate D slightly
concaved or dished attached by a shank d around which the cord may be wound and
bound between the plate D and the body of the shoe. The eyes b are made integral
with the screw shank and smaller collar or disc 6, the said shank being adapted to
pass through the fly of the shoe to receive the imitation button f which is retained by
the screw-shank and which in turn retains the said shank and eye b firmly connected
to the fly. The buttons may be easily removed and buttons of different color, size
and shape substituted.

page_text: Having now particularly described and ascertained the nature of the said inven-
tion, and in what manner the same is to be performed, I declare that what I
claim is ;-
1. The body A of the boot or shoe, provided with the series of eyes a in combination
with the series of eyes secured to the under surface of the fly B of the shoe, sub-
stantially as described.
secured to
2. The eyes a secured to the body of the boot or shoe and the eyes
the under surface of the fly B, in combination with the lacing cord C, plate D, and
shank & secured to the body A of the boot or shoe, substantially as described.
3. The eye formed with the shank and collar or plate b² in combination with
the fly B and removable imitation button ƒ screwed upon the shank b', substantially
as described.
Dated this 08th day of January 1888