History - The 1950's shoe shine contests in North Carolina

During the 1950’s an amazing shoe shining contest was organised in Wilson, North Carolina, peaking with 12,000 visitors one year. In what was almost like a rock concert the shoe shiners performed their shine work on shoes of people from the audience, where both the final shine and the entertainment they gave was awarded. Read the lovely history of these contests.

In 2014 when I organised the first Super Trunk Show in Stockholm, Sweden, me and the friends I organised it with wanted to include a shine contest of some sort. I knew there had been shine contests before, but it was hard to find any info on how these actually were carried out. The rules we decided on then – 20 minutes, one brand new shoe, wax polish, polishing cloth, brush, nylon cloth and water – have been used for all the championship contests I’ve been part of organising since, in Sweden, the Netherlands, USA and of course the world championships. Also basically all other shine contests that has been organised since this new revival has been inspired by these, and used the same or very similar set-ups, in Japan, Russia, Belgium, Chile and so on.

Albeit we do see some shoe shiners showing off artistry in these contests, who are real entertainers apart from being great at shining shoes, no one really reach the levels that many of the contestants did in the huge shine contests held in North Carolina some 70 years ago. I came across the story about these a few years back, and it’s really a great one.

As most likely know, back in the days, there were a huge amount of shoe shiners on the streets, in hotels, train stations and so on, especially in the western world. In fact, the first photographed humans in history was a shoe shiner and the man who had his shoes shined. They are seen in the photo “Boulevard du Temple”, taken by Louis Daguerre at 8.00AM a spring morning 1838, of a street in Paris. With the exposure time of this daguerreotype photo being several minutes, the street looks empty since people moved too fast to be captured, everyone except the shoe shiner and his client.

The “Boulevard du Temple” photo by Daguerre, with the first humans ever to be captured on a photograph – the shoe shiner and the customer. Picture: Louis Daguerre / Wikimedia Commons

In many cases, the ones who shined were young boys, often from poorer families, who did this to support the family with an income. That’s where the expression “shoeshine boy” comes from, which was the common name used for shoe shiners for decades, even if it was older men, or women for that matter. In the cities, all wore proper leather shoes, and many of these – men as well as women – regularly had them shined by these shoeshine boys.

In 1949 the American songwriters Harry Stone and Jack Stapp wrote the song “Chattanoogie Shoe Shine Boy”, a really catchy tune that’s been recorded by among others Frank Sinatra and Bing Crosby, but the main hit version was done by Red Foley. The song is about a shoe shiner who entertain his customers, among other things with how he “pops the rag”, which was a thing shoeshiners did to sort of play a nice rhythm, and get some extra tip. The base beat of the original Red Foley recording is made with catchy rag popping, even if they didn’t include this in live versions as the one below.

Some people in the black community of the city of Wilson, North Carolina, had the idea to bring the shoeshine boy Bo McCann, who had been the inspiration for the song, to the town and do a show. They then decided to grow it to also invite shoe shiners to compete on stage. A local radio host loved this idea, so he used his reach to promote the event heavily. Eventually they ended up with two competition classes, one for professional shoe shiners and one for amateurs.

On the day of the event, the crowds gathered in masses. Hundreds of men, women and children filled the Reid Community Center in Wilson, and on stage the shoe shiners did their best to outperform each other both with the shine they achieved, but also with the show they put on. Cause here, it was almost as much about popping that rag and entertaining as it was on achieving a high shine.

A photo from the first shoe shine contest in Wilson, in 1950. Picture: Black Wide-Awake

A couple of years later, in 1952, the event had grown even bigger, with the Wilson Department of Recreation and several local stores sponsoring the event. Over 1,200 people attended, and competitors had traveled in from other parts of the state. Bo McCann was there again, several recreation directors from other cities attended to gather info to start similar events back home, and LIFE Magazine had sent a reporter and photographer.

One of the contestants in the 1952 edition of the Wilson shoe shine contest.

Over 1,200 people in the crowd.

It’s after a photo from the first event started circulating online that photos taken by the LIFE photographer John G. Zimmermann became public. The report never made it into print, but John’s daughter Laura recognised the event from photos she had found when she went through her fathers archive when he past away. She shared the images and eventually a local TV show made a report about the photos, the shoe shine event and one of the contestants, Curtis Philips, who won the professional category three times and was the big star of the shine scene.

Curtis Philips, three time champion of the professional category.

After the contests Curtis Philips continued for three decades as a shoe shiner, mainly at Cherry Hotel in Wilson. In the TV coverage the then 80 years old Curtis showed off that he still had shoe shine skills. This when visiting a former a protege of his, Michael Moor, who ran the only remaining shoe shine service of Wilson, called Mr. Magic’s Shoe Shine Parlor. This place was closed a few years ago. Now, sadly, what was once a city where shoe shining was thriving and where this craft was celebrated, has none such dedicated services no more. To prevent the loss of more such places, all current shoe shine competitions and all other ways promoting this craft are highly positive.

Jury members discuss the points.

Here the “shoeshine boy” Bo McCann, who was the inspiration for the Red Foley song, is putting on a show with his rag, while a band is playing. Previous pictures: John G. Zimmermann / WUNC