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The Most Iconic Air Max Moments
Written By: @defynewyork
The time has come to celebrate another Air Max Day, a day where lovers of all things Air Max can display their passion with pride and of course likes on IG. In doing that though lets not forget the moments and even the history that brought us here. You see, many not in the know believe Air technology begins and ends with Nike and while they may have perfected the technology, the reality is the history begins way back in the 1800’s.
In 1893 a man by the name of Fillmore More of Farmington Connecticut built the first inflatable shoe. The patent ends with:
“I claim a shoe having an elastic air tight bag between the insole and the outsole, a stem on the bag, an inflating tube and valve accessible for the purpose of inflation, the inflating valve and stem being located in a channel made in the upper side of the outsole at or near the instep of the shoe, substantially as set forth.”
Now if images of the Reebok Pump come to mind you would be on the right track, but the truth is the technology would go on to be cited by both Reebok regarding their Pump patent and Nike regarding their patent for Air technology.
As time passed brands like the Weyenberg Shoe Company with their “Massagic Air Cushion shoes” of the 1950’s and of Karhu- who registered Karhu Air Cushion in 1976 would also beat Nike to the punch. By 1977 – a full year after Karhu- Nike too would register Air and it would be nearly a decade before a trip to Paris would inspire Tinker Hatfield (Nike’s one time architect) to start a footwear revolution by cutting a chunk out of the midsole and showing the technology they had boasted of for years. This “window” or as most of us know as “visible air” in the midsole would create a visual display of Air Technology in action and was first found on the Nike Air Max 1. That one shoe would not only shock the footwear industry but also be the DNA for a lineage of Air Max shoes spanning 29 years. Today, in celebration of that monumental moment in footwear history we are going to look back at 20 of the most memorable Air Max moments over the years.
