R. So when I came back from war I thought, well, I don't know what to do, I'd better go back to shoe- making, and they offered me 3/6d a week. I'd be twenty to twenty-one; but however there must have been a sort of scheme along which one of our Stables of Ambleside - Jonathan Stables, he took me in as an apprentice and I finished my time off there.
I. How long was that?
R. Three years; and from there I started up on my own, in Little Langdale, and that's where we finished.
I. Were you the first one to set up in Little Langdale?
R. Oh yes, there was no one else.
I. What were you making mostly? Were you shoe-making?
R. Farmers' boots. I made farmers" boots. I used to make them for every village I should say, and every - all the boots in the village excepting Anthony Chapman. I never made Anthony any; but there was Parker, and Joe Weir.
I. Where did you get the material, leather?
R. It was the same as what we were in those days, brought up from father to son and he was a real chap from Workington that had their own leathers, tanneries, that's it, it was seven year was the oak bark which tanned leather.
I. You mean they had it in a pit for seven years?
R. Yes, and it was wonderful leather.
I. That's what you used?
R. Oh yes, we used nothing only the best. You see, that's why its so deceptive is buying boots. You can see a pair that's so-and-so, and a pair that's so- and-so, but if you put the right stuff into a hide, into a pair of boots, you've got to charge because they're so expensive.
I. How much, do you remember, how much you would charge for a good pair of boots in those days?
R. Fifty shillings, two pound ten.
I. And yet you were being offered 3/6d a week?
R. I was offered 3/6d a week to make them. I've got one or two of the old things around; and I've even got the pig bristles that we used to use as needles. You see, not the same as a saddler; a saddler used needles, but we used to use a pig's bristle. Wild boar brush they used to call it.
I. Were they hard enough?
R. Yes, they were thick.
I. Why did you use that? Was it kinder to the leather?
R. Well, because it was the easier and the best way instead of using needles when you were doing a hundred yards of stitching in a pair of hand- made boots - a hundred yards!
I. What was the thread?
R. Hemp. It was number three for the fine stitching of the uppers and number ten for the soles and the welts.
I. Was there any metal - any studs or anything?
R. Oh, we had everything. Tricounis for climbers, tricounis and alpine nails they used to use; but for the ordinary farmer we had nails and big serrated bills. And hand-made toes, steel toes, and steel heels which was hand-made by the blacksmith, hand-made.
I. So everything was local? The leather?
R. Yes, well, Workington.
I. How long would a pair of boots like that last given a farmer using them? Would he need a pair a year?
R. Well, it all depends on how you use them. Now I retired from boot- making because I was so disgusted, after the War, that there was such a lot of rubbish turned out. I daren't put them into a pair at all because it would have given me a bad name. And that was that so I never used - you see, there's only half the hide which is really guaranteed to be anyway any good at all. And that half a cow, understand me, a cow's hide is stripped right down the back and you have its belly, legs and shoulders, more or less that's rubbish and that's how you get your cheap shoes, instead of the high-class shoe. To look at it, of course, its all one thing, but...
I. But go back to 'how long'; they would vary, but might a farmer need a pair each year, or would he..?
R. Well, I had one pair I made for a - he travelled an 'entire'; and he had a hundred mile a week, and it did him two thousand six hundred miles! It did him two seasons, and he said, 'The first time I put them on, I'd to take them off because,' he said,' they were laming me feet that much I had to take them off and I finished the day in me stockinged feet.' And that was Mr Taylor of Staveley.