Goloshes (Fr. galoche, 'a patten, clog, or wooden shoe; ' from the Low Lat. calopedia, 'a clog,' and the Gr. kalopous), india-rubber over-shoes which were introduced into Great Britain from America about the year 1847. At first clumsily made, and of inferior quality, they were, mainly by the exertions of the Hayward Rubber Company in America, soon much improved in quality and appearance, and the demand for them increased rapidly. The largest manufacture for the production of vulcanised rubber goloshes and other shoes in Great Britain is that of the North British Rubber Company at Edinburgh, where more than 100 distinct kinds of boots and shoes are made, and the production amounts to several thousand pairs a day.
The rubber is (1) torn up into small pieces, washed, and rolled together in granulated sheets; (2) it is then mixed, by the aid of heated rollers, with the vulcanising materials, consisting of sulphur, litharge, lampblack, pitch, rosin, and sometimes other materials; (3) the final stage in the preparation of the material is carried out after the shoes are made, and consists in subjecting them for nine hours to a temperature of between 200° and 300° F. Rubber so treated is said to be vulcanised (see INDIA-RUBBER). The so far prepared sheets of material are again rolled out between the heated rollers, till they are of the required thickness for the shoe uppers. Both soles and uppers for each shoe are cut out separately with a knife. The calico or other linings are coated round the edges with some strongly adhesive cement, probably dissolved rubber, and then all the pieces are ready to be put together. The earlier part of the work is done by men, but women actually make the shoes. A clever girl will make forty pairs a day; a very clever one fifty. That is to make a pair of shoes in ten or twelve minutes.
The chief defect of goloshes is that they keep the stockings constantly damp, and the feet uncomfortable, by preventing the escape or the absorption of the perspiration. Various modifications of the ordinary goloshes are made: thus, there is a kind with warm felt lining; another kind have felt or cloth uppers and ankles, and are often called snowshoes.