The school slipper rarely looked new.
Indeed, quite the opposite.
Former pupils repeatedly describe battered old gym shoes with flexible uppers and soles worn smooth through years of use.
But whose shoes had they originally been?
There is probably a very simple answer to much of the mystery:
lost property.
Anyone who attended school in those days will remember the lost-property cupboard or basket.
It was an extraordinary archaeological collection of school life.
Single football boots.
Odd socks.
Scarves.
Vests.
Shorts.
Swimming costumes.
Towels that nobody wished to admit owning.
And, naturally, plimsolls.
In the days before expensive designer trainers became commonplace, enormous numbers of children wore inexpensive rubber-soled gym shoes for PE.
They were forgotten, abandoned, outgrown and replaced.
Consequently, the average school could accumulate quite a collection.
One teacher recalling his early teaching career around 1970 remembered precisely this situation: a plentiful supply of old plimsolls sitting in the changing-room lost-property basket.
The sizes varied considerably, from tiny children’s shoes to much larger examples.
A teacher wishing to acquire a permanent slipper therefore had a remarkably convenient source available.
No mysterious school-equipment catalogue was necessary.
He merely needed to investigate lost property.
