YESTERYEAR: Baynham Shoe Store by Pat Sides

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Customers being fitted for new shoes in the Baynham store appear indifferent to Santa Claus, who is shopping for footwear himself in December 1937. The business, which originated in Lexington, Kentucky, relocated to 323 Main Street in Evansville in 1927. The three men in the rear of the sales room are probably the Baynham brothers, Frank, Henry, and Leslie. Over the years, they developed what they claimed to be the largest independent retail shoe store in the Midwest. Besides the quality of its merchandise, Baynham’s was also known for the live monkeys displayed in glass cages after the store expanded in the 1950s. The Main Street location closed in 1984, and branches still operating in North Park, Washington Square Mall, and Eastland Mall were sold.