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Shoe-fitting fluoroscopes, also sold under the names X-ray Shoe Fitter, Pedoscope and Foot-o-scope, were X-ray fluoroscope machines installed in shoe stores from the 1920s until about the 1970s in the United States, Canada, United Kingdom, Germany and Switzerland.〔(Shoe-Fitting Fluoroscope (ca. 1930-1940) ) Oak Ridge Associated Universities.〕 In the UK, they were known as Pedoscopes, after the company based in St. Albans that manufactured them.〔(Pedoscope X-ray apparatus, St Albans, England 1930-1955 )〕 At the beginning of the 1930s, Bally was the first company to import pedoscopes into Switzerland from the UK. In the second half of the 20th century, growing awareness of radiation hazards and increasingly stringent regulations forced their gradual phasing out. A shoe-fitting fluoroscope was a metal construction covered in timber approximately high in the shape of short column, with a ledge with an opening where the child (or the adult customer) would then place his or her feet in the opening provided and while remaining in a standing position, look through a viewing porthole at the top of the fluoroscope down at the x-ray view of the feet and shoes. Two other viewing portholes on either side enabled the parent and a sales assistant to observe the child's toes being wiggled to show how much room for the toes there was inside the shoe. The bones of the feet were clearly visible, as was the outline of the shoe, including the stitching around the edges. The gimmick changed from decade to decade to suit the market at the time, but the most famous sales pitches were that the fluoroscope allowed salesmen to better fit shoes and that it made it more fun for kids to go to the shoe store. During the Great Depression, a popular sales pitch was that the fluoroscope allowed the best possible fit, which made for longer-lasting shoes and implied that customers would not have to buy as many pairs for themselves or for their children. In reality, the shoe-fitting fluoroscope was nothing more than a way to attract potential customers because the fit also depends on the flesh size, which was difficult to make out in the fluoroscope. ==Invention== There are multiple claims for the invention of the shoe-fitting fluoroscope. The most likely is Dr. Jacob Lowe who demonstrated a modified medical device at shoe retailer conventions in 1920 in Boston and in 1921 in Milwaukee. Dr. Lowe filed a US patent application in 1919, granted in 1927, and assigned it to the Adrian Company of Milwaukee for $15,000. Syl Adrian claims his brother, Matthew Adrian, invented and built the first machine in Milwaukee; his name is featured in a 1922 ad for an X-ray shoe fitter. Then there is Clarence Karrer, the son of an X-ray equipment distributor claims to have built the first unit in 1924 in Milwaukee, but had his idea stolen and patented by one of his father's employees. In the meantime, the British company Pedoscope filed a British patent application in 1924, granted in 1926, and claimed to have been building these machines since 1920. The X-ray Shoe Fitter Corporation of Milwaukee and Pedoscope Company became the largest manufacturers of shoe-fitting fluoroscopes in the world. 抄文引用元・出典: フリー百科事典『 ウィキペディア（Wikipedia）』 ■ウィキペディアで「Shoe-fitting fluoroscope」の詳細全文を読む スポンサード リンク
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