Red Wing Shoe Store
Image courtesy of Red Wing Shoe, Co. Corporate Archive
Built: 2009
One can’t talk about the history, or the present, of Red Wing, without talking about the Red Wing Shoe Company.
As Red Wing’s population grew in the late 1800s, the need for shoes grew with it. And because industrialized communities were much more spread out at that time, a local shoe manufacturer could succeed without competition. In those early years, S.B. Foot cornered the local leather tanning and shoe manufacturing market, and provided footwear for much of the community.
In 1905, Foot teamed up with Charles Beckman, a talented salesman, to start The Red Wing Shoe Company.
A decade later, the Shoe grew when they began providing boots for soldiers in World War I.
A couple decades after that, the company weathered The Great Depression, and produced more boots during World War II.
As the global economy became more interconnected in the following years, Red Wing was able to capitalize, and spread its product around the globe.
Now, the Shoe is the second largest employer in town, behind Treasure Island Resort & Casino. It is also the most widely known company based in the region, with stores all around the world, and celebrities often wearing their boots.
History is full of what ifs, and it is entirely possible the Red Wing Shoe company would be much smaller today, or possibly never have come to be, if things had gone differently for co-founder Charles Beckman.
In 1873, Beckman left Europe aboard the S.S. Atlantic for New York. The Atlantic, operated by The White Star Line, which would later operate the Titanic, was running low on coal. The ship’s crew decided to divert to Nova Scotia for additional fuel, but unfamiliar with this new route, the crew failed to navigate the rocky seas, and the Atlantic sank. 535 passengers perished, while 429, including Beckman, endured freezing water and strong waves to eventually make it to shore.
Once Beckman found great success in the shoe industry, it all almost came to an end again in 1907. This time, Beckman was on a train headed to Kansas City to sell shoes. But in the middle of Iowa, Beckman’s train was hit by another train, sending cars off the rails. He was seemingly uninjured, and made his way to Des Moines to do business there instead.
Beckman did eventually pass away in 1912, but by then the Shoe Company was firmly established, and ready to meet the challenges and opportunities that would come in the rest of the 20th century.
