Willie Lusk Jr.

Lusk stood six feet six and weighed about 260 pounds, and despite the segregation of the time most of his employees were Anglos. Besides the flame stitching, his boots could be known by a box toe and careful fit. They went on the feet of Shirley Temple, Chill Wills, Audie Murphy, Robert Taylor and Ronald Reagan, Betty White, Merle Haggard and Ray Price, Gen. Omar Bradley and Chile's former president Gabriel Gonzalez Videla. Ebony, the Wall Street Journal and Sports Illustrated wrote about him, and Coronet in July 1951 called him the best bootmaker in the world.

What the plaque says

Willie Lusk Jr. (1914-1976) Born in 1914 in San Angelo, Willie Lusk Jr. worked as a shoeshine boy in N.A. Brown's boot shop when he was 12 years old. He then apprenticed with Czech bootmaker Frank Urban, earning a daily wage of one dollar. In 1934, Lusk moved to Lubbock and worked for Brown's brother, E.E. Brown, at Brown's boot and saddle shop on Broadway. After a few years, Lusk was promoted to foreman, overseeing 22 other bootmakers. In 1940, he married Dunbar H.S. teacher Mildred Kavanaugh; the couple had three children. Benny Binion, wealthy Dallas gambler, was a frequent customer and asked why Lusk, a skilled craftsman and good manager, was not operating his own shop. When Lusk said he had no funds to get started, Binion loaned him the money at a time when few African Americans in Lubbock owned a business. Lusk set up his new boot shop at 1706 Ave. A. Within six months of opening in 1946, Lusk's boot shop received enough orders to put him and his employees six months behind. Lusk promoted his business by touring western states to bring in new customers from rodeos, livestock shows and Binion's Horseshoe Casino in Las Vegas. Lusk traced customers' feet directly onto the order form alongside notes and measurements. He did not sign his boots with any logo or trademark, but many are identified by his distinctive flame stitch variation and by use of wooden pegs instead of nails in the soles. His handcrafted boots were sought out by actors, musicians, politicians and working cowboys around the world. The business also grew through positive referrals and national press, such as a 1951 Coronet magazine article titled "Texas King of Cowboy Boots." In 1952, Lusk moved into a larger storefront to accommodate the increased demand. His work remains valued for its craftsmanship and artistry. (2021)

Where it stands

Worth the stop nearby

• American Windmill Museum — 0.8 mi
  Lubbock's park of restored water-pumping windmills and early wind chargers, more than 70 of them turning outdoors and the rare ones under roof, with a megawatt-era turbine overhead.
• Buddy Holly Center — 1.4 mi
  The city's museum of Buddy Holly and West Texas music in a 1928 railway depot, with the house where the Crickets worked on That'll Be the Day moved next door.
• National Ranching Heritage Center — 3.9 mi
  A Texas Tech outdoor museum where ranch houses, barns, windmills and a depot from across the ranching country were moved one by one onto a single park beside the campus.
• Lubbock Lake Landmark — 5.3 mi
  A bend of Yellow House Draw on Lubbock's north edge where digging has found nearly 12,000 years of people on the Southern High Plains, layer on layer, from Clovis to the 1880s.

More markers nearby

• Mary & Mac Private School — 0.4 mi
• Mount Gilead Baptist Church — 0.6 mi
• Bradford Knapp — 0.8 mi
• Paul Whitfield Horn — 0.9 mi