BEHIND THE GLASS WINDOWS: MEET ARAKEL ARAKELIAN, OWNER OF ARES SHOE REPAIR
Beacon Hill Times
June 17 2014
June 16, 2014
By Beacon Hill Times Staff
Arakel Arakelian
Ares Shoe Repair has been around a long time but now there’s a new
guy inside.
In March, Arakel Arakelian stepped behind the glass windows of the
ancient-looking tiny shop that for forty years has kept Beacon Hillers
well heeled. He may be new at 84 Charles Street but he’s no novice –
he’s been stitching and shining footwear, purses, belts and more for
48 years.
Like so many skilled craftsmen who pass their profession from
generation to generation, Ara learned the art of shoemaking and repair
from his father in Lebanon, where the Armenian family settled after
being forced from their homeland in Turkey at the time of the 1915
Armenian genocide.
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“Armenians are not known for being educated. They did not have
the means,” said Ara. “Instead they are great craftsmen -tailors,
shoemakers, pan makers.”
Ara began his apprenticeship with his father at age 6 because, he
said, children that age didn’t go outside to play because they had few
toys. “I had a windup horse with a cowboy on it. Once a year I would
take it out, play with it for a while, and put it back on the shelf.
That was my only toy.”
Instead, by the time he was 13 or 14 he was well on his career path,
able to work on some of the easier machines such as one used for
shaving and edging leather. He continued to gain experience in the
shop, where he remembers meeting other Armenian families such as the
mother from Jordan who occasionally stopped by to purchase shoes for
her sons and daughters, including a 12-year-old named Elizabeth.
In 1972, when Ara was 25, he and his father decided to visit his
mother, her stepson and other family members who in 1969 had come to
the Watertown area. With its surrounding towns of Waltham and Belmont,
Watertown was and still is a major center of the Armenian diaspora
in the United States. It was a comfortable place for immigrants like
Ara and his father, he said, because everyone shared the love of the
homeland they had lost and the Armenian foods, culture and language.
“When I came to America, I found a lovely lady accompanying my mother,”
said Ara. “I said ‘You are Elizabeth, the 12 year old girl from my
hometown all grown up! I came to America to see my mother but if
you’ll marry me, I’ll stay.’ ”
Apparently Elizabeth agreed because she is often seen today at his
side at the shoe repair shop. “I do the work on the shoes and she
comes in, polishes them up and talks with the customers,” said Ara.
The couple raised two children. Their daughter, who earned her
masters degree, was the first in the family to earn a degree. She
and her husband have two children and live in Marblehead. Their son
graduated from Northeastern and will be married in October. Ara, who
could not speak English when he arrived in America, now speaks four
languages besides Armenian – Arabic, Turkish, French, English and is
learning Spanish, because of its important role in American society.
Soon after arriving in the area, Ara and his father opened a shoe
repair shop in Belmont. Later on, opportunity brought Ara to Federal
Street, where he ran two shops for many years. He sold those businesses
three years ago because of painful back problems that made it difficult
to work. After two major surgeries and much exercise, he felt well
enough to purchase the Charles Street business with all its contents
from Michael Demirgian, a Romanian Armenian who had operated it for
24 years after buying it from its namesake Ares.
During his many years as a cobbler, he has learned all aspects of the
craft. He is surrounded by tools and machines, like trimmers, skivers,
heel wheels, McKay and Landis stitchers. But his most important tools
are his hands.
He prides himself that he has never told a customer he couldn’t solve
his footwear problem. A missionary once came to his shop and told
him the story of an 18 year old girl from the poor state of Moldova
near the Ukraine who had never walked because one leg was about a
foot shorter than the other. He figured out a way to build a shoe
that enabled her to walk for the first time.
“Another time a customer come in with a cane,” he said. “I asked
what was wrong with him. He replied that his toes were rotten from
diabetes and that he couldn’t walk. I asked him to take his shoes
off. I took them in and did what I thought I should do. He put the
shoes on and started walking normally. He hugged and kissed me and
said he’d never been able to walk as well.”
He has found Beacon Hill to be a good place to be and particularly
enjoys meeting its families. “You meet the son in the morning when he
drops off a shoe and the father in the evening when he picks it up,
” he said. “They are good customers. They are happy someone can help
them out.”
Here there is more work for him. “People walk everywhere, and when they
walk, they wear their shoes down. And the brick sidewalks, they’re my
friend. High heels get stuck between the groves. This pair of shoes,
for example, has been in three times since March to have its heels
repaired,” he said, pointing to a pair of red stilettos on the counter.
Ara said the shoe business is recession-proof because, like food,
people always need shoes. Due to the current high prices of women’s
leather bags, more and more customers are asking him to restore them
rather than purchase new ones. He picked up a large black Burberry
bag valued at about $1500, explaining that for $150 he’d give it new
life by washing its lining, making a new handle, mending a tear and
giving it a good polish.
Like the two owners of the shop before him, he said he’ll be around
for a long time, until “my eyes don’t see anymore.”
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