Athens Cobbler Practices 'dying Art'

As a teen, Mildred Latimer helped with the family business. Her brother Jimmy Dobbs once made customized boots for Alabama Coach Gene Stallings and Auburn Coach Pat Dye.

"I swore I wouldn't marry anyone who was in the shoe business," she says, and shrugs her shoulders at her story's irony.

She didn't marry a cobbler, but after she married Bill Latimer, he got a job from her dad.

Mildred Latimer still works in the store, and her husband has turned to politics, becoming a Limestone County commissioner.

While her husband paves roads, she sews straps on purses and buckles on sandals. Until recently, she would customize as many as 60 boots a year for high school majorettes and University of North Alabama Pride of Dixie Band majorettes and Lionettes.

"It was time consuming and hard on my hands," Mildred Latimer says, glancing at her fingers. "You have to take the lining apart, measure their legs, cut excess material and sew the lining back."

Her son, Mike Latimer, grew up watching television in a back room of the Market Street location and playing in the downtown buildings. He started working in the shop shining shoes at age 12 to earn money for a bicycle.