Vintage Speed Skates

Vintage skates are hip. I do not want to pass up the chance to present classy 1950s speed roller skates.

I came across these skates during a vacation in Austria about 15 years ago. They were displayed in an small old-fashioned toy store. With price tag, but rather as decoration, than with the expectation of selling.

Unused speed roller skates from the 1950s. Manufactured by Polar Werke, a well-known German ice and roller skates manufacturer back then. The company had the claim “Polar, the brand with the polar bear”. The factory was located in Remscheid, in North Rhine-Westphalia, a city with tradition in mechanical engineering and toolmaking industries.

Polar offered artistic and hockey skating boots, but no low-cut boots, which are preferred in speed roller skating. So the boots came from Seuvenia, a sports shoes maker in Mönchengladbach, just 60 km away from Remscheid.

The skates consist of:

• Polar Rex, single-action plates
• Polar maple plywood wheels, with loose-ball bearings
• Seuvenia leather boots

Very nice skates, a well preserved piece of skate history.