Shoe Fitting Fluoroscope

A history of the little known shoe store x ray machines called fluoroscopes that were used to show your feet inside your shoes.

Shoe fitting fluoroscope. The american version has its roots in world war i with the united states military s intense study of the fit of boots and its effect on soldiers health. The machines which were large wooden cabinets with two or three viewing. The shoe fitting fluoroscope was a common fixture in shoe stores during the 1930s 1940s and 1950s. It has long been used and no direct clinical evidence of harm has yet been established advertisement.

In the uk they were known as pedoscopes after the company based in st. 1930 1940 basic description. The shoe fitting fluoroscope is not an instrument with obviously hazardous potentialities. An opening on the side of the box allowed the customer to place his or her foot between the tube and the fluoroscopic screen.

Tests of direct beam intensity and stray radiation from shoe fitting fluoroscopes indicate wide variability of exposure of patrons and salesmen with some exposures far in excess of standards proposed for safe use of the apparatus. The shoe fitting fluoroscope was nothing more nor less than an elaborate form of advertising designed to sell shoes state jacalyn duffin and charles r. Albans that manufactured them. The x ray shoe fitting machine fluoroscope was a common fixture in american shoe stores during the 1930s 50s.

Shoe fitting fluoroscopes also sold under the names x ray shoe fitter pedoscope and foot o scope were x ray fluoroscope machines installed in shoe stores from the 1920s until about the 1970s in the united states canada united kingdom south africa germany and switzerland. Hayter in a journal article in. The shoe fitting fluoroscope consisted of an upward facing x ray tube mounted inside the bottom of a metal box and a fluorescent screen at the top with three viewing ports. A big hit for a short time si.

In ads the machines were touted as a new way to check the fit of a shoe thereby guaranteeing that the shoes would be comfortable. A typical unit like the adrian machine shown here consisted of a vertical wooden cabinet with an opening near the bottom into which the feet were placed. When you looked through one.