The sad headline from Roadside America: Middlegate, Nevada - Shoe Tree - Chopped Down!
For non road-tripping Dopers, shoe trees are curious totems found along our highways and byways. This one stood for more than a decade on a stretch of America’s Lonliest Highway.
The story behind the tree goes as such: A young couple camped there on their wedding night and got into a tiff. The woman said she was gonna walk away and the man said, “If you do, you’ll have to walk barefoot,” and threw her shoes in the tree. Then, the man got in the car and drove to Middle Gate to have a drink at the bar. The bartender talked him into going back to his wife, which he did. A year later, they brought their first child’s shoes to the tree and tossed them into the branches. Since then, people have been adding and removing shoes from the tree so that when you drive over a hill on that very desolate road, all that you can see is this cottonwood tree with shoes hanging from every branch.
I really hate littering, but shoe trees get a pass from me. I think of them more like a communal art project. They usually get cut down or set on fire by drunken yahoos. I guess it’s a wonder the Middlegate tree lasted as long as it did.
One of those could look really cool on a windy night when you consider how many kids’ shoes have red LEDs in the heels.
Murdered? Really?:dubious:
lieu
January 6, 2011, 6:43pm
4
Haven’t seen that headline since Diamonds Are Forever .
Yeah, I know, murder isn’t the best term. I considered “Herbicide on US50”.
Do we know the whereabouts of Michael Vick on the night of December 30th?
(only tree for miles…cruelty to dogs reference. OK, I’ll just go away now)
Wile_E
January 6, 2011, 7:33pm
7
The suspect in the tree-murder was described as a very large man with an axe and a cerulean-hued bovine companion.
lumbers out of thread
smacks Wile E with a 2 x 4
Would you have been happier if she’d said she was going to leave?
