LEWISTON — Herbert Koss remembers coming home in the summer so dirty from cleaning shoe warehouses with his dad and older brother Eddie that his mom had to scrub them down:

“We looked like we came out of a minstrel show.”

One of Irene Harvey’s jobs during 40 years in shoe shops: plugging with hot cement:

“You only got 2 cents a rack. So if you want to make money, you’ve got to go, so you had a lot of burnt fingers.”

Lorraine Brown and Jeannine Roy have spent their lives in the industry. They won’t give it up. Both 77-year-old women refuse to talk retirement.

They’re five of the 52 faces.

Museum L-A launched its new exhibit Saturday, “Portraits & Voices: Shoemaking Skills of Generations,” with private and public receptions that had 500-plus people reading snippets of oral histories next to 52 portraits of people who lived and worked shoes.

Executive Director Rachel Desgrosseilliers said it was the most complex exhibit the museum had undertaken, about three years in the making.

“They have such pride, such pride in what they were doing,” she said.

Some of the portraits, by documentary photographer Mark Silber, show the men and women now relaxing at home, retired after long careers. Some are still on the job, at machines. Their stories tell of fun times, trying times and decades of dedication.

One shoe worker, Barney Charest, contacted the museum for a follow-up interview from his hospital bed, saying, “You don’t understand, we have to do this now.”

Desgrosseilliers said oral historian Andrea L’Hommedieu spent a half-hour with him before Charest told her, “OK, I think it’s time. Can you ask my wife to come in? He passed an hour after we left,” Desgrosseilliers said.

Charest’s wife, Louise, is holding his picture in his portrait.

The exhibit features several family members, like the Koss brothers, and three generations of Rancourts: David, Michael and Kyle — grandfather, father, son.

Roger Nadeau is one of the 52 and a museum volunteer. He started in shoe shops at 16.

“I relocated a lot, aggressive, always looking to make an extra nickel,” he said. He retired after 30 years at Falcon Shoe.

“I think it’s quite an honor to go down in history for other generations,” Nadeau said.

Morris Silverman walked the long museum room recognizing many of the faces. Silverman has owned Louie’s Clothing, a clothier to generations of shoe shop workers, for 61 years.

“The shoe industry was not just a place that people worked — it was a foundation for the community,” he said. “We don’t have that today. People work here, they work there. It’s a culture we don’t have.”

The exhibit will stay open for 10 months.

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