[Congressional Record Volume 144, Number 56 (Thursday, May 7, 1998)]
[Senate]
[Pages S4487-S4488]
From the Congressional Record Online through the Government Publishing Office [www.gpo.gov]




                         TRIBUTE TO JOHN ADAMS

  Mr. LEAHY. Mr. President, many of the times I have spoken about 
Vermont, I have talked about the fact that in small cities and towns 
everybody knows everybody else. We are a State of neighbors, from the 
stores on the corner to the places of worship and our town squares.
  Recently, the Burlington Free Press wrote an article about John 
Adams. He has spent 40 years fitting shoes and boots and footwear for 
the people of Burlington, VT, and its surrounding areas.
  When they were writing this article, it brought back to my wife and 
myself the memories of going into that same

[[Page S4488]]

store with John Adams with our young children, lining them up, getting 
their shoes. Those children are all grown now. And John Adams is still 
there. He is still one of the reasons why I love my home in Burlington 
and why Vermont always has been and always will be home.
  I ask unanimous consent that an article from the Burlington Free 
Press, dated Sunday, April 19, 1998, entitled ``Shoe Biz'' be printed 
in the Record.
  There being no objection, the article was ordered to be printed in 
the Record, as follows:

            [From the Burlington Free Press, Apr. 19, 1998]

                                Shoe Biz

                          (By Melissa Garrido)

       John Adams remembers when Oldsmobiles rolled down Church 
     Street. He recalls the days when ladies strolled by the shops 
     in matching handbags, hats and high heels. And he can't 
     forget the time Abernethy's department store gave away mink 
     scarves for its 105th anniversary in 1951.
       Burlington's main drag has changed since then. One thing 
     hasn't changed: People are still wearing the wrong shoes.
       ``You could see where the wrinkle is on his shoe. It's in 
     the wrong spot--he's wearing his shoe too big,'' said John 
     Adams, peering over his square glasses at a man in clunky 
     sneakers hoofing past his store, Adams Boots & Shoes.
       Adams, 73, has been selling shoes on upper Church Street 
     for more than four decades. To him, the street is the heart 
     of Vermont. He made his best friends and found prosperity 
     here. He watched Abernethy's endure a fire and remembers when 
     expensive leather shoes cost $15.
       As businesses came and went, Adams' customers grew out of 
     Stride Rites into Florsheim Royal Imperials. He has outlasted 
     almost every other entrepreneur on Church Street.
       ``I've had the privilege of going from the old days to the 
     new days,'' Adams said in his raspy voice. A quiet man, Adams 
     sometimes winds up when he tries to make a point, and uses 
     his hands to recount a story.
       ``I saw . . . (Church Street) transform into the 
     Marketplace,'' he said. ``Every time they put a brick down, 
     it was a step toward another year.''


                              First steps

       Adams' shoe career began in the 1950s, when he quit his job 
     installing radio and television towers around the United 
     States for a construction company. He felt the job was too 
     dangerous a way for a husband and father to earn a living.
       In the late 1950s, he landed a position as a shoe clerk 
     with the Massachusetts-based Dennis Shoe Company, which 
     rented retail space at Abernethy's, the old Vermont landmark 
     on the corner of Church and Pearl streets.
       ``I didn't ask how much it paid,'' he said. ``I just came 
     up to work.''
       Adams had no clue he would remain in the foot business 
     until the turn of the century.
       In 1983, a year after Abernethy's closed, Adams relocated 
     the Dennis Shoe Co.'s operation to Almy's in the University 
     Mall. In 1984, the shoe company moved back downtown into the 
     Gladstone building, but went out of business the same year. 
     Adams bought the small store and renamed it Adams Boots & 
     Shoes.
       ``I was excited about it,'' Adams said. ``But I still 
     wasn't my own boss. The customers were the boss; they still 
     are.''
       In 1996, he moved across the street, back into the original 
     Abernethy's building on upper Church Street, to make room for 
     the Eddie Bauer store.
       ``The store has been his life,'' said Adams' 46-year-old 
     son David, a senior vice president at Vermont National 
     Bank. ``It's what keeps him going.''
       ``All he does is talk about the store,'' he said.


                             Personal touch

       With a shiny shoe horn tucked in his back pocket, Adams 
     bent down and pressed the outer edge of Alex Brett's foot to 
     feel the girth of a shoe. He tugged on the tongue, poked at 
     the space between the 11-year-old's big toe and the tip of 
     the shoe, and squinted as he examined the vamp.
       ``I like the way this one feels better,'' Adams told Alex's 
     father as he squeezed the sides of the left 8\1/2\ oxford.
       ``Which one feels better?'' he asked the boy.
       ``The left.''
       Adams tossed his hands in the air and grinned: ``I might be 
     old, but I can still tell the difference.''
       The shoe store owner still runs his business the old-
     fashioned way.
       He special-orders shoes, calls his elderly female customers 
     ``young gals,'' and he never lets customers put on and take 
     off their own shoes.
       ``There's nothing that irritates me more than a clerk who 
     watches a customer put on a shoe,'' said Adams, who calls 
     himself a shoe fitter, not a shoe salesman. Unlike the 
     average part-time shoe clerk, he brings a formal education in 
     fitting shoes to his trade.
       Decade after decade, his customers return, first with their 
     children, then with their grandchildren. They come for his 
     personal service and his expertise in fitting children's 
     shoes.
       For Sen. Patrick Leahy, the shoe fitter is part of his 
     fondest memories from his days as a Burlington prosecutor in 
     the 1960s. Leahy used to buy shoes from Adams for his 
     children when they were in grade school. Leahy remembers when 
     Adams would line the three up and measure their feet with a 
     cold, metal Brannock, a device used to gauge the size and 
     width of a foot. ``He never lost his patience even when the 
     youngest one was squirming,'' Leahy said.
       ``In an impersonal world, it's kind of nice to walk in 
     somewhere and not only do you know the person in the store, 
     but they know you and actually care,'' he said, ``We still 
     have places like this in Vermont, and that's why it will 
     always be home.''


                              slower pace

       These days, Adams is trying to stay in business as the mom 
     and pop shops are replaced by franchises. The four blocks of 
     Church Street between Main and Pearl Streets have become a 
     melange of tourists toting shopping bags, students in 
     backpacks heading into bars, and downtown employees grabbing 
     a quick bite to eat.
       ``I have no intentions of giving up, and I don't intend to 
     retire,'' Adams said.
       Business trends do not shock the entrepreneur.
       ``Everyone is concerned about Wal-Mart and the other 
     stores. I'm not a lover of the big-box stores, but they do 
     bring in an extra 5,000 people.
       ``That just means we have to work a little bit harder,'' he 
     said.
       Like the business in his store, Adams is slowing down.
       A couple of years ago, he was diagnosed with cancer. Though 
     he says he has ``licked it,'' he doesn't like to talk about 
     the ailment that keeps him away from his customers about one 
     day a week--not even to his employees.
       ``I can't wait to go to work the next morning, because you 
     have your mind on other people,'' Adams said. ``You forget 
     the aches and pains.''
       Aches and pains brought Jan Lawrence of Williston to Adams 
     about 30 years ago. Her daughter was having foot problems, 
     and a Barre doctor suggested she take her to Adams to have 
     her feet fitted properly.
       ``You spend anything you want on clothes,'' said Lawrence, 
     52, ``but never gyp on a shoe, because you'll have foot 
     problems later on in life.''
       Today, Lawrence buys her shoes from only Adams.
       ``You are important to John at all times,'' she said. 
     ``Even when he is not feeling well, he does his best to serve 
     you and your needs.''
       As Adams moves toward the millennium, he is adamant about 
     remaining a part of Church Street. The shop owner is eager to 
     see new stores like Filene's sprout in downtown and lure 
     customers. He hopes a new department store might rekindle the 
     heyday of Abernethy's.
       ``It was a lot more fun in those days than it is today,'' 
     Adams said. ``It was a slower pace back then. Everyone is 
     always in a rush today.''

  Mr. LEAHY. Mr. President, I thank the distinguished Senator from 
Delaware for his usual courtesy. I see the Senator from Iowa, so I will 
not suggest the absence of a quorum. I yield the floor.
  Mr. GRASSLEY addressed the Chair.
  The PRESIDING OFFICER. The Senator from Iowa.
  Mr. GRASSLEY. Mr. President, I ask unanimous consent to have the 
floor to speak for a few minutes as in morning business.
  The PRESIDING OFFICER. Is there objection? Without objection, it is 
so ordered.

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