Shoe Tree

    365.115

If you look closely on the West Bank of the University of Minnesota, you’ll find trees bearing strange fruit near the Washington Avenue bridge. The tree branches are loaded with shoes–maybe a couple hundred. Although I was a campus tour guide for four years, trips to the West Bank were rare, so the folklore behind this campus tradition was not part of our script. It’s just as well. Theories abound, but no one really knows when or why the shoe tree started. It’s quirky and fun. It’s just something students do.