Special Jack Dearden shoes to be auctioned (From Knutsford Guardian)

Special Jack Dearden shoes to be auctioned

11:30am Friday 2nd January 2009

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SHOES repaired using 10,000 tiny nails - and the trophies won by the man who created them - are to be auctioned in Knutsford.

Jack Dearden, who died in 1985, won more than 50 trophies for his decorative soles, which featured scenes such as the Taj Mahal and the Houses of Parliament.

Above his shop in Leigh, a banner proclaimed him the ‘winner of the British Isles Championship’.

Now, after several years in a family member’s attic, shoes, trophies and newspaper cuttings will be sold at Marshall’s in Church Hill, Knutsford.

“His father before him was a shoe repairer and they started in a front room of a terraced house,” said consultant Simon Nuttall.

“These shoes were to show how good he was.” Competitors would be given a pair of old shoes and challenged to repair them - and then adorn them with intricate decorations.

Mr Dearden began taking part after seeing entries at a Shoe and Leather Fair in Manchester.

“They’re beautiful,” he thought.

“But I think I can equal them if I try.”

He won his first competition and began to dominate leather, rubber, neolite and pinpoint classes during the 1950s.

“Competition work keeps you on your toes and up-to-date with new methods,” said Mr Dearden.

“It opens your mind to seeing the things that will be beneficial to your commercial work. Knowing your record people have confidence that you will not make a bad job and so they bring their work to you.”

But nowadays pinpoint work and ornate, decorative soles are a dying art.

Peter Harris, head of training at Timpson, which has a store in Princess Street, said the skill was far too time-consuming - and therefore expensive - to be used on customers’ shoes.

“There would be very few people around doing it now,” he said. “Part of it is having an interest in it, because it’s non commercial.”

Mr Harris said Timpson’s head office had some examples of pinpoint decorated shoes.

“It’s fantastic,” he said.

“It was marked on the gap between the pins and the margins, and other things you or I would not notice. It is terrific to look at.”

Auctioneer Nick Hall said the lot, to be auctioned on January 27, could fetch between £500 and £800.

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