18th Century Device to Cope with Spring Thaw

The dirt roads before macadam came into use were so messy that both men and women sometimes wore pattens to elevate themselves above the mud and refuse. Pattens were also used by floor-washers.

Pattens are wooden platforms that were strapped onto shoes that the wearer wanted to protect. Another version has an iron ring that supports the wooden sole. They were in used Europe and in this country into the 19th century. 

It is recorded that the Spanish rabbi Solomon ben Abraham Ibn Adret, (c.1233-1310) was asked if it was permissible to wear "patines" on Shabbat, to which he responded that it was the custom of "all the wise in the land" to wear them, and certainly permitted.

Used for centuries, they grew out of favor. In A Memoir of Jane Austen, her nephew James Edward Austen Leigh wrote in 1869 about his aunts Cassandra and Jane: "The other peculiarity was that when the roads were dirty the sisters took long walks in pattens. This defence against wet and dirt is now seldom seen. The few that remain are banished from good society and employed only in menial work…"
 

These curiosities from another time are now very rare; two examples of pattens from the collections of the Bergen County Historical Society are on exhibit at the Steuben House. 

Visit Historic New Bridge Landing on April 7, 2013, 1 to 4:30 pm!
Historian and writer Firth H. Fabend will present an illustrated lecture "The People of New Netherland: Roughnecks, Multi-taskers, Grandees, or All of the Above." at 2 pm. Dr. Fabend has recently published a new book New Netherland in a Nutshell.  BCHS Collections of the Bergen Dutch will be on exhibit.

Experience history in one of the storied places where it was made!


Visit the Revolutionary War Battleground at The Bridge That Saved A Nation and tour the Zabriskie-Steuben House, Demarest House, Campbell-Christie House and Jersey Dutch Out Kitchen. 

The Bergen County Historical Society, a non-profit volunteer organization, founded in 1902, is currently raising funds to build a Bergen County Museum of History on its property, which forms the core of Historic New Bridge Landing. Event takes place at Historic New Bridge Landing, 1201 Main St, River Edge, NJ 07661.

All 3 Bergen-Dutch houses will be open.
Suggested donation: $7 adult, $5 children, BCHS members free.
BCHS: All-volunteer nonprofit • All programming made possible by your donations. www.bergencountyhistory.org.

Sources:
http://janeaustensworld.wordpress.com/2011/02/12/metal-pattens-awkward-p...

http://www.scribd.com/doc/120914276/18th-Century-Shoes

http://thomasguild.blogspot.com/2012_08_01_archive.html