My American Hometown Shoe Store

This is the first installment in a series about the people, places & things from my recent trip to America…

In just about every small town in America, there’s a little shoe store that carries quality brands for local customers. Many of these shoe stores are a family business that have been serving generations.

I guess I’m lucky because where I come from, our local family-run shoe store is Sears Shoe Store in Fort Oglethorpe, Georgia.

This store has nothing to do with Sears, the big American department store chain.  Rather, it’s owned by the Sears family who have been shoeing people of the Tennessee Valley for decades.  My grandparents shopped there for work shoes as well as “Sunday shoes,” my parents still shop there, and when I’m in the States, I shop there for myself and my children.


Sears is chock full of all kinds of quality footwear goodness for men, women & children, representing the best brands from the United States as well as fashion brands known around the world.


The thing I love most about Sears is that you can always find dead stock somewhere in their cavernous maze of shoes.  If you ask the staff, they can pull just about anything out of their floor-to-ceiling stacks of shoes.

This includes vintage baby shoes, ladies heels from the 1960s or, as I asked for & got on a recent visit, a pair of white Converse All-Star high tops that were Made in U.S.A. It is also exactly the place I knew I could find a very rare pair of Spalding Saddle Oxfords, which are now one of my most prized pair of shoes.

Sears is a local legend.  But for me personally  it’s a constant treasure trove of dead stock classic vintage finds and the source for all the best Made in America shoes.

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9 Responses to My American Hometown Shoe Store

  1. Love it….really want to shop there! By the way, I just got a pair of KILLER looking engineer boots sent to me to wow the streets of Yerevan with!

  2. Gina says:

    Sears is truly a floor-to-ceiling time machine/maze of shoes. Engineer boots…in Yerevan…on a girl?! Be careful out there.

  3. Eli says:

    Lovely. I look forward to reading more stories from your trip.

  4. Lizzie says:

    I am seriously in love. And it’s only about 3 hours from me! Thanks for this one.

  5. Gina says:

    Eli: Glad you’re already enjoying this series from my trip.
    Lizzie: It’s worth the trip! Sears has been voted Best Shoe Store by the Chattanooga newspapers for years. If you do go, let me know & I’ll give you some more local tips.

  6. I realy like old stores and old sines.
    I like old films when you can see where the she salesman help
    the ladies try on shoes for size. Ps I visit the staes from time to time and
    stop to check out old items when i see them.

  7. Gina says:

    Sears is one of those places where they’ll help you try on the shoes. That is, if there’s enough room in the aisle, because the store is completely jammed packed with shoes!

  8. Bronwyn says:

    Loved seeing this! I pointed it out in August to my husband when were there for a class reunion. Soooo remember wading through stacks of shoeboxes so high you couldn’t see from one aisle to the next. What amazing bargains we’d find there! I had my navy blue Nickels from there straight thru college.

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