What were they thinking: sock wedgie

8/24/2012 12:52 PM EDT

OK, hands up anyone who has ever had a problem with their socks creeping between their toes. Now I know it happens with underwear every now and then – the classic wedgie, but have you ever had a toe wedgie? Can it even happen? Clearly Julius Burrell from California is afflicted with this condition so badly that he would be willing to buy special shoes and socks to help prevent this traumatic condition. He also believed that many other suffered his fate, so he patented (3,938,264) the idea of putting Velcro into the shoe and attaching some to the sock so that the sock could not move from its intended place. Let’s forget about the fact that this may make the shoe/sock combination quite uncomfortable and that you may require a shoe ½ size larger to make room for the Velcro.

Taken from the patent:

Having thus described the invention, what I claim as new and desire to secure by Letters Patent of the United States is:

1. A shoe fitted with a section of Velcro material in the inside forward toe section of the shoe for the purpose of engaging the forward section of the sock of a wearer of the shoe, said Velcro material being fixed to a forward toe section of the shoe that is inclined generally perpendicular to the plane of the sole of the said shoe.
2. The combination as recited in claim 1 together with a sock of a shape to completely enclose the portion of a foot, on which it is worn, within a shoe, said sock fitted with a section of Velcro material mounted externally of the forward toe section of the sock in a position to matingly engage the section of Velcro material located in the toe section of the shoe.