Berwick Kaler bought these boots in the now-defunct Army & Navy Stores in York's Fossgate in 1977 to wear with his costume for Philholmena, one of the Ugly Sisters in Cinderella, the first wig and frock role he played for York Theatre Royal. He wore them for the final time in his last and fortieth pantomime The Grand Old Dame of York at the York Theatre Royal. Generations of children and their parents knew and loved Berwick as the Dame who called his audience: 'Me babbies, me bairns', threw chocolate biscuits called Wagon Wheels out to the audience, and handed bottles of Newcastle Brown Ale to some of the luckier occupants of the stalls.

Berwick never wore make-up for his Dames, who he always wanted to be patently a man in a frock. To this end he also wore these brown workman's boots, their only flamboyant note one yellow lace and one red. He wore them with the yellow lace and the red lace on the right and left boot respectively, to contrast with the red right leg of his socks and the yellow left leg.

In 2019 when he gave the boots, Berwick Kaler recalled: 'These are the original boots I bought in an Army & Navy Store in York 40 years ago - I knew then my Dame was never going to wear high heels! They have never been polished, probably out of laziness at first and then grew into a superstition. Although I had a backup pair they were hardly used. I first walked on stage as Dame wearing these boots and forty years later walked off wearing the same boots.'