AUGUSTA, Maine — In a shop filled with shoes and boots, Tom LaCasse sits at an old Singer commercial sewing machine. He moves a pair of leather and rubber boots under the needle. The machine makes smooth stitching sounds, as his feet pump the treadle that provides the power.
"It gives me more control," Tom explained about the foot-powered machine.
He added that it used to be in his father’s shoe repair shop in Skowhegan, 50 years ago. That’s where Tom first learned the cobbler’s trade.
This shop aside, shoe repair is a skill and a trade that seems on its last legs. Maine only has a handful of cobblers left.
Tom believes he is one of just three or four full-timers still in the business. That includes his older brother in Skowhegan, a shop in Scarborough, and possibly one other, plus a couple of part-time shops. And all those, he said, are operated by people "well beyond 50."
Tom is 64 and remembers the days when Maine, which once had many shoe factories, also had lots of cobblers.
"Even when I came down here in '84, there were two cobblers here [Augusta], plus me. Two in Waterville, one in Brunswick, one in Bath, four in Lewison Auburn area. All are gone. They got old and retired and couldn’t find anyone to do it."
Tom learned the trade as a teenager, and after trying college for two years, came home and started helping his father.
"I fell into the business," he explained. "I needed to earn a living and I knew how to do this."
Then he added: "I did like working for myself."
And he has done just that in the Augusta shop, by himself, for 39 years.
The business is called Tom Finn Shoe Repair, the name it had when he bought it from the previous owner.
"They come in and say, 'Mr. Finn, how are you?' I have been Mr. Finn for 40 years," he laughs.
While fewer shoes are made to be repaired, and fewer people look to get their shoes fixed nowadays, Tom LaCasse said he is consistently busy. He admits, however, that the kind of shoes he sees have changed. Far more are rubber sole casual shoes than before.
"It's amazing how it changed in the pandemic," Tom explained, "Especially in Augusta for me. I used to do a lot of dress shoes for lobbyists and others always all dressed up. With the pandemic, no one was in person. I had a gentleman come in a few weeks ago, just to visit. He was a lobbyist and said I don’t wear [dress] shoes anymore."
Tom said he hopes to find someone to learn the trade, someone who wants to come in and basically apprentice, then take the business over. A video on his Facebook page talks about that dream. Tom said he’d like to work a few more years, then hand it off to someone who will keep the business and the trade going.
"I'm thinking sooner rather than later," he commented quietly, thinking of the future of cobblers in Maine, their age, and the apparent lack of people interested in sustaining the trade.
"Ten years from now, you may be hard-pressed to find a shoe repair."
Anyone who wants to learn, he said, come talk to him.