MIDDLEBURY — “Just speak up if we can help you,” Dan Freeman called to the customers who’d ambled into the Middlebury shoemaker’s shop.
Just as quickly as he’d looked up, he was back to work. Behind his worktable, Freeman’s hands were in constant motion — stretching the leather in one shoe, and boxing up another pair to ship off to a customer. He pulled lasts, the foot-shaped models used for designing shoes, from the crowded shelves around his workbench.
