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shoepack†
[< Am.E by folk etymology < Lenape (Delaware) shipak < machtschipak inferior shoe, as opposed to a moccasin]
DCHP-1 (pre-1967)
Entry from the DCHP-1 (pre-1967)
This entry may contain outdated or offensive information, terms, and examples.
1n.
a variety of moccasin having uppers of thick, oiled leather that extend above the ankle and, often, a stiff sole. [See picture at larrigan.]
Quotations
1853
Shoe-packs, a species of mocassin peculiar to the Lower Province, cow-hide boots, and a bonnet rouge for the head, complete the costume of the Canadian lumberman.
1912
. . . while I was still enduring the pain of mal de raquette his shoe-packs had worn through and his feet were imperfectly tied up in pieces of canvas.
1946
. . . the habitants . . . shod their feet, not in honest English boots, but with cowhide made up after the fashion of the Indian moccasin ("shoe-packs").
1956
Much better to have walked in, straight from the canoe, with the worn shoepacks, the shirt and breeches stained with balsam and smudged by campfires, the black bird's-nest of beard
2n.
a kind of boot having high, laced uppers of heavy oiled leather and thick soles, often of hard rubber.
Quotations
1882
. . . he came pounding along Notre Dame street, in Montreal, in his red shirt and tan-colored shupac boots, all dripping wet. . . .
1904
Inside their high-laced, capacious "shoe-packs" were several pairs of yarn socks.
1940
It is only in the fall and the spring that the snow is soggy, and in those seasons shoepacks with rubber bottoms and leather uppers replace the moccasins.
1962
Harold stared at a disk of melting snow on one of his dubbined shoepacks.