The Sage of the Shoe Rag

On May 2nd I attended the Small Business Success Conference in Pasadena, CA. One of the conference participants, American Insurance Network, had an interesting "hook" to bring you into their booth.

Those of us who have walked the exhibit halls of conferences and conventions have assiduously loaded our tote bags with a variety of give-aways, usually logo items: pens, pencils, baseball caps, calculators, coffee mugs, pads of paper, etc. Other vendors tempt us with food, candy, water or another beverage.

But the owner of American Insurance Network offered a complimentary shoe shine. Brilliant, because you spent at least five minutes sitting in the chair while you got the shine, all that time available to learn about the services of the company.

In the realm of guilty pleasures, the shoe shine ranks right up there with a great cigar.

And that brings me to memories of the late Walter Clark, World War II Army veteran and San Diego's legendary shoe shine man.

In the downtown office that I worked in during the early 1980s it was a right of passage to be introduced to Walter, who held court in the now-closed Florsheim Shoe Shop in the Westgate Hotel. Walter knew every politician, attorney, judge and stockbroker in town. Then Mayor (and later U.S. Senator) Pete Wilson was a loyal customer.

Over the years I got to know Walter. He was politically astute, highly opinionated, and a keen observer of the human condition.

There are two stories about Walter that I tell often.

Walter suffered a heart attack in the mid-1980s. He was so well-known and beloved that the evening news reported on his condition, in part as a request from Sharp Memorial Hospital. So many people called the hospital to inquire about Walter that the switchboard systems collapsed. When Walter returned to work he refused to shine wing-tip shoes saying it was too hard on his heart...he also admonished those wearing the stout brogues (after first suggesting that these middle-aged lions of the legal profession had last purchased shoes before they graduated from college!) to purchase a new, more stylish pair from one of the young men in the shop.

At the time I made three stock market reports each day on KJOY, an easy-listening...well, OK, elevator music...station. One day I asked Walter his opinion of the economy and he said that "things were bad." The next morning the report on Leading Economic Indicators was released, and things were bad. Thus began a ritual. The day before the Leading Economic Indicators were released I would visit Walter and ask for his opinion. In every case he was right. He predicted an improving economy and later opined that the economy was roaring. Finally I asked Walter how he formed his opinions.

"Look across the street," he said. At the time Horton Plaza, a shopping mall in the heart of downtown San Diego, was under construction. "I count the number of African-American kids working on the job. When the number starts to go down I know that the economy is starting to slow down. When there are no blacks on the job, I know we're in for hard times. And when they started getting hired again, I figure things are improving. They are the last to be hired and the first to be fired."

That direct observation made Walter the financial sage of shoe rag.