The Forest Republican · Oil City, Pennsylvania · 1911

Base Ball Shoes, $2.50

July 1911: Levi & Co. of Oil City has added sporting shoes to the summer stock, and addresses the customer with perfect courtesy: if you are inclined to partake in any sport and want to be properly shod you should see us. Base ball shoes, $2.50.

Nobody sells shoes like this anymore, and the game is poorer for it: “We have added this season to our summer stock a full assortment of Sporting Shoes. In all sizes. If you are inclined to partake in any sport and want to be properly shod you should see us.”

Inclined to partake. Properly shod. This is a shoe advertisement written in the prose of a dinner invitation, and then it names its price without flinching: “Base Ball Shoes, $2.50.” One model, apparently, or at least one price, from Levi & Co. at the corner of Center, Seneca and Sycamore streets, Oil City, Pennsylvania, a corner ambitious enough to touch three streets at once.

It ran in the Forest Republican over in Tionesta, a town away, because in 1911 the shoe store worth the trip advertised where the trip started. Pair it with Spaulding & Hale’s attractive prices to clubs buying in quantities and a person could kit out for the whole season, properly shod and attractively priced.