Juntura, Oregon - The Shoe Tree

I emailed a letter to my friends lamenting the fact that I could not find the shoetree on Rt 20 in Eastern Oregon. To my surprise, I got a response from my friend Judy (a woman who can find anything) with a link to RoadsideAmerica.com....

So, while I am so sad about the shoe tree, I am also happy to know what happened, and that I am not crazy.

Here are photos shot in Oct. 2008 of the three new shoetree wannabe sites along the same stretch of road. [Mindy Cambiar, 11/04/2008]

I drove past this location on 12/22/07 and the tree is gone. There was an Oregon Department of Transportation dump truck parked next to the site and they were filling the truck with the remaining shoes (The truck was full!) I know that a week earlier the tree was still standing, as some coworkers had driven by on the way from Boise. When I was by in April the tree was looking quite dead, so I guess the recent snow of this year mixed with the weight of the shoes was too much.

I trust another will "grow" along the same route. [David Huyg, 01/11/2008]

I was driving my pick-up eastbound across Oregon, taking a cooler northern route meandering to Arkansas. I had to backtrack 3 miles, finding a turn-around for this tow rig by the shoe tree. [Carolyn M. Donegan, 12/18/2007]

This is the Shoe Tree east of Juntura, Oregon on US Hwy 20. [Al Charpentier, 01/30/2007]

I observed this tree in May of 2005, but didn't have a camera. So, when traveling by in 2006, we stopped to take photos. Unfortunately, the tree is beginning to break up due to the weight of the shoes....there is not much else to do in this part of Eastern Oregon! [Diane Hazen, 09/25/2006]