Head chef at Grazing Kurt Neumann with secretary of the Gundaroo and District Historical Society, Esther Robinson with one of the old shoes found in the ceiling of the former Gundaroo hotel. Photos: Sally Hopman.
Back in the mid-1800s, it seems they really knew how to put the boot in when it came to warding off evil spirits.
Simple. Just store shoes somewhere where they wouldn’t be found, like in the roof of what used to be the Royal Hotel at Gundaroo – now the home of the award-winning Grazing restaurant.
When Grazing head chef Kurt Neumann decided to clear out an old part of the former hotel with its stone and mudbrick walls and ironbark ceilings, he came across a space above a set of stairs which led to some small rooms. Behind an old brick fireplace flue he found a bundle of straw.
“As I was cleaning it out I found these old shoes in the straw,” he said. “At first I thought they were dolls’ shoes but then I saw what looked like an adult’s boot with elastic siding.”
He uncovered 11 shoes in all, ranging from a tiny toddler’s boot to what looked to be women’s shoes because of their pronounced heels, to men’s boots.
“I wasn’t too sure what to make of it all,” he said. “But then my mum said she’d heard people hid shoes in the old days to ward off evil spirits, so I thought I better not throw them out.”
Legend has it that in the earliest of days, shoes were used as a form of home insurance. At a time when folk believed in witches, ghosts and demons, shoes were hidden in homes to ward off such evil. How? Apparently because if the evil force believed the shoe to be a person, it would attack the shoe rather than the person. Many of the shoes belonged to children who were believed to have purer spirits.
Secretary of the Gundaroo and District Historical Society, Esther Robinson, said it was fascinating to discover something that had been hidden away for so many years, especially at somewhere like the old Royal Hotel which had so many fond memories for Canberrans.
“You can’t help but wonder about the stories of the people who owned the shoes,” she said.
“It’s a delightful piece of our history.”
Grazing, which Kurt has been running since 2011, started life as the Royal Hotel in 1865 under the stewardship of William Affleck who, history tells us was, ironically, teetotal.
The former pub is today classified by the National Trust as a “building of historic significance”.
One of the old shoes found in the ceiling of the 1865 Royal Hotel, now the popular Grazing restaurant at Gundaroo – even the laces are still intact.
It has had many lives since opening as a travellers’ inn in 1865, from a post office to the only licensed hotel in the region. But in 1928 that licence was transferred to the new Hotel Queanbeyan and the Royal became a private home.
Perhaps its most famous iteration came in 1968 when Queanbeyan businessman Ron Murray bought it for $3750 and transformed it into the Gundaroo Gallop pub, attracting tourists and locals alike to sample “the real Australia”. Only true-blue tucker was on the menu, from kangaroo tail soup to damper and beasts of steaks.
It also marked the start of what was to become a bus transport business which continues to operate today.
So, did the shoes ward off evil spirits in Gundaroo?
“I’ve been here a long time,” Kurt said, “and I’ve been here alone at night but I’ve never encountered any spirits.”
Kurt said some of the shoes would be lent to the Gundaroo Historical Society to display in the village’s Literary Institute when it staged one of its regular open days but said he was keen to return them to where they were found.
“It’s important to retain the heritage of a building like this one,” he said.
“And for it to keep us safe.”
Grazing is located on the corner of Cork and Harp Street, Gundaroo. They’re open for lunch Thursday to Saturday and for dinner from Thursday until Sunday. Check them out via their website, Facebook page and Instagram.
