Brightest Young Things

If there is one thing I know, aside from Wayne's World trivia, it's cowboy boots.

I have a tan line on my shins and suffer from body-silhouette dysmorphic disorder when I see myself in the mirror not wearing cowboy boots- seriously, I don't recognize my natural leg proportions anymore.

My love for cowboy boots began in college, when I discovered a gold pair of boots at Annie Creamcheese that I wore out within 3 months. Then I began collecting boots everywhere I went- Boston, Milwaukee, Colorado, Texas, Mexico and EBAY.

Eventually I wrote a 30 page paper arguing Boot making as a folk art- for which I found limited scholarly sources.

So here is a collection of my favorite cowboy boots ever, The Lucchese State Boots. This fabled special edition line included a pair of boots for each state in the union at the time of commission, 1949. Each boot features unique and exact colors for the states flag, capital, bird, flower and state commodity. The following are the only boots that remain from the collection- and they are exquisite.

Virginia:

Nebraska:

My personal favorite, Louisiana:

Idaho:

Arkansas:

Kansas:

New Mexico:

Wisconsin:

Missouri:

Nevada:

South Carolina:

North Dakota

West Virginia:

Washington: