Tuesday, October 6, 2020

Shoe houses of the world

(Haines Shoe House, photo by me) 

There are, I'm sure, many novelty houses around the world that are shaped like shoes or boots. We have our own right here in York County, the Haines Shoe House, and after all these years of living here I never got there for a tour until Ashar and I went in June 2019. (In a 2017 post on Only in York County, Joan notes that Shoe House owner Mahlon Haines used to give couples vacations for weddings, anniversaries and other occasions. It gave his shoe business great free advertising, of course.) 

Here are some other photos I took last year, during on overcast day in which we got hit with some big thunderbumpers shortly after we left the Shoe House.
And here's an old postcard of a different shoe house, one that's about 8,000 miles from the Haines Shoe House...
This footwear that you can go inside is located at Kamala Nehru Park in Mumbai, India. The structure was built in 1952 as part of a children's park. According to a 2018 article in The Hindu, the shoe house was damaged by a lightning strike around 2013. The house and the park were temporarily shut down for a makeover (and a blue coat of paint for the shoe) that got mixed reviews in 2018. 

This postcard was mailed to Burnley, England, in 1967 with this note:
28-9-'67
Dear Pam,
Hope you recieved [sic] my last letter. Thank-you for the card and bookmark. This is the Old Lady's Shoe in Kamala Nehru Park, which is situated on Malabar Hill. We get a good view of Bombay from here. Please reply.
Love, Mahrukh
(Bombay is what Mumbai was called from the 1500s to 1995. Its oldest names, according to Wikipedia, are Kakamuchee and Galajunkja.)

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