The Story of the Maine Hunting Shoe
Text excerpted from My Story by L.L. Bean, 1960

“Every year I made up a hunting party to go to Wild River, New Hampshire, where we camped in the logging camp office where my cousin and I went, when I was fourteen years old. In fact, I was much more interested in hunting that in running the store. I was also quite interested in getting the right kind of footwear for deer hunting....

In 1911, I decided after a hunting trip that the shoes I was wearing were no good... I grew tired of wearing shoes that hurt my feet. I took a pair of shoe rubbers from the stock on the shelves and had a shoe maker cut out a pair of 7 ½ tops. The local cobbler stitched the whole thing together. I quite innocently praised my new shoe to a prospective customer, Edgar Conant, who came to the store. In September, 1911, I made a pair for him to try out. From his recommendation, I decided I had struck the right thing .....

In 1911 our business was in a basement 40’ x 25’ and our catalog was 5½” x 8” with three pages which took less than 100 pounds of paper... I hired Ted Goldrup to cut, and his wife to stitch the tops. With the local cobbler attaching the tops to the rubbers, I was in the mail order bushiness....

My assistants, the Goldrups, worked in a shoe factory by day and did my work at night, Mrs. Goldrup stitching on her own sewing machine at home.... This was in 1914, and the business was entirely local. But in a few months I found that I had something. I secured heavier rubber, improved the tops, invented and patented numerous items that made the Maine Hunting Shoe unexcelled....