Evolution of the Golf Shoe

There is no doubt, have progressed to other remarkable inventions of the boot more golf. Aircraft and vehicles, for example, or the modern computer. That said, grateful boot Golf is a species extinct.

You can thank the field and Flint for it. In 1923, the company William Park's patented 0.1917 version of the shoe golf, lopped off the top and voila - Born shoes for American Golf. Not just any shoes, mind you, but shoes FootJoy.

Name ring a bell?

In fact, golf shoes specific dates to at least 1857, when he "Booklet golfer", a publication of the Scottish, and is referred to Shoes "roughed up with nails or small branches of the tree," which made it possible for golfers to "rally a comfortable and safe on the ground most of the skid can to be transformed by a Meridian in the dog days. "

(In that same year, the company was founded Packard Bert and shoes in Brockton, Mass., will become in later, you guessed it, Flint and field).

In 1891, and generated high metal removable, to the chagrin of greenskeepers everywhere. Not to mention the golfers, who sometimes felt through the soles of heavy forks poking. Talk about the death march.

Jump forward to 1927, when he was named Field and Flint FootJoy shoes official United States team's first Ryder Cup, get it out of Walter Hagen uncommon. However, preferably of the nails elegant Johnston and Murphy of the statement-making country clubs in the '20s waste.

In 1940, the first of its line of FootJoy shoes ladies. Unfortunately, there was little to distinguish them from those of men. The decade also saw the rise FootJoy and Charles Eaton - later known as the Etonic - and the leading brands in the ranks of professional and amateur golf.

Did not happen a lot over the coming decades, as was the golfer content to wear shoes Oxford style and manufacturers were happy to crank them. Finally, in 1970, and burst into research and development with the times, and the soles of shoes and rubber developed for - a quantum leap in comfort and flexibility. Is the leading Etonic Leather treatment of water, and other important innovations, in the 1980s.

The next decade brought a golf shoe ever closer to the cousins built in sports for jogging, tennis and basketball. Replacement of lightweight fabrics to breathe and polymers thicker, heavy materials and made golf shoes more comfortable than ever, and durable.

In the 20 century turned, met the high end of the metal in the form of a plastic wedge - to the delight of greenskeepers everywhere. Application firms that had prevailed for a long time trade sports shoes, like Nike, Adidas and technologies existing golf shoes and made a serious dent in the market share of established firms.

And increased competition sparked an explosion in innovation and companies jockeyed to make the shoes lighter than ever and more comfortable and - no small step - more aesthetically diverse. Today, consumers can choose styles ranging from traditional oxfords saddle golf shoes like mathematical models, or even sandals.

Golfer and a female, no longer stuck with a manly footwear.