Famous Wayne Shoe Shine

Kenny has been shining shoes in downtown San Francisco for more than thirty years.

Famous Wayne Shoe Shine is “world famous.” Famous Wayne lives across the San Francisco Bay in Oakland, California and commutes into the city. I had my shoes shined during a Society for Photographic Education conference. The SPE national conference was in San Francisco this year, but I did not travel far to attend. I live in Oakland, the same town as Famous Wayne.

(bryan farley)

 

Tomorrow I am flying to Seattle, Washington for the Journalism Education Association  and National Scholastic Press Assocation national conference. I will present a new workshop about photo stories with Dave LaBelle. I might use slideshow photos I took of Famous Wayne to generate conversation.

How do you read a photo? What photo is the best first image for the story? Where does the story start?

Where does this story end? What images are missing?

Here is the rest of the slideshow.

This entry was posted on Wednesday, April 11th, 2012 at 11:07 pm. It is filed under People and Portraits and tagged with , . You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed.

2 Responses to “Famous Wayne Shoe Shine”

  1. MIKE says:
    March 15, 2017 at 12:18 pm

    WAYNE CAME TO SAN FRANCISCO FROM OHIO OVER 20 YEARS AGO. AT THAT TIME,
    SFPD NEVER MADE BACKROUND CHECKS BEFORE ISSUING A PERMIT. WAYNE SPENT
    SEVERAL YEARS IN A MENTAL HEALTH FACILITY IN OHIO. HE IS SOMEONE WHO
    HAS SPENT HIS LIFE PLAYING THE SYSTEM AND USING OTHERS TO DO HIS BIDDING.

    FOR THE PAST FOUR MONTHS, THE STAND HAS NEVER LEFT THE LOCATION. THERE
    HAS BEEN A GUY SLEEPING INSIDE. IF YOU EXIT THE BART THERE, IT IS COMMON
    TO SEE SFFD PRYING THE LOCKS OFF TO GET THE GUY OUT.

    WAYNE HARASSES THOSE AROUND HIM. NO STREET ARTIST WILL SET UP NEAR
    HIS STAND AS HE WILL HARASS THEM ALL DAY. AT TIMES, HE GOES DOWN TO
    THE PLAZA TO TELL THE ICE SKATING RINK HOW TO RUN THEIR BUSINESS;
    CREATE DISCORD WITH THE ARTISTS OR JUST BE AN ASSHOLE.

    NO ONE CARES ABOUT THAT SHOE SHINE STAND OR WAYNE. HE IS AND ALWAYS HAS
    BEEN A PAIN IN THE ASS WHO CANNOT MIND HIS OWN BUSINESS.

    • bryan farley says:
      March 15, 2017 at 1:26 pm

      Mike,

      Thank you for taking the time to read and post.
      I met Wayne five years ago. At the time I saw him, many people visited his booth. People cared about him, at least enough to have their shoes shined. There were other street businesses next to him. I did not know him well enough to comment about his long term mental history, nor would I have done so in this post if I had known.

      Wayne has a shoe shine stand in the San Francisco Financial District, at least he did in 2012 when I published. If he is not doing well now, I am sorry to hear it.