An ordinary rope with a copper tip is able to keep not only shoes on the leg, but also business
1-2. The most convenient ways of lacing: “Christmas tree” and “straight”. In Europe, they prefer a “direct” lacing, and we have a “Christmas tree”.
3-4. For short laces, a “butterfly” method is used. British soldiers lace a “butterfly” (“army” method): so the boots are better bent.
Seeing that from this it is possible to benefit from this, Harvey Kennedy – a native of Ireland, who lived in England, remembered about laces. After all, with their help, you can easily adjust the size of the shoes: weakened the rope – the boot became wider, tightened – closer. March 27, 1790 Harvey received a patent for a lace as a means of fixing shoes. It just never occurred to anyone to do it before! Publishing a long -existing thing, Harvey Kennedy became a millionaire (although at first the trade went and not very briskly). He earned about 2.5 million dollars on laces. Having made a state, Harvey and his family moved to America, where he lived until the end of his days.
On a wide stream, the production of laces was put not in England, but a little later in the USA-factories opened in Massachusetts and New Hampshire. Even in the most difficult times, when large factories went broke, the cord business continued to give good profit. On the laces to this day you can make good money. In 2011, the Irish brand mr. Kennedy, named after the very entrepreneurial Harvey Kennedy, released cords of gold of the 999th sample worth $ 19,000 and from silver at a price of $ 3,000.
It is worth its weight in gold
More than 5000 years ago, people had already used laces. In 2010, in a cave in the south of Armenia, in the region of Vaoots-Diz, archaeologists found the most ancient in the world of boots. Radiocarbon analysis confirmed that the shoe was made in 3600–3500 BC. e. The boot was laid. In a similar way, the American Indians fixed the moccasins, the Greeks and the Romans – the sandals, and our ancestors – bast shoes.
In the XIII century, the laces were already with conical tips that facilitated the extension in the holes. There is an assumption that in the 15th century Christopher Columbus, having hit Cuba, sold copper tips from the laces to the islanders for gold ingots. Women strung small pipe from copper on a thin rope and wore like a necklace.