The granpappy of the three stores, M.B. Sales, moved into its location at Ashland and Walton, just north of Chicago, thirty-six years ago. Alcala's Western Wear rode into town on Chicago, just west of Ashland, twenty-five years ago. And just four months ago, a young varmint, Finn's Exotic Boots, moved from farther west to a spot across the street from Alcala's. Whatever fashion winds blow elsewhere in the city, the dusty streets around these parts echo year-round with the clomp of cowboy boots.

John Wayne, Clint Eastwood, Annie Oakley. There's a certain romance to cowboy boots. Rich Alcala knows that feeling: "When you put a pair of boots on, you walk differently. You feel more control."

Alcala's clientele is diverse, although Rich Alcala notes that "boots go further back with our Mexican culture. The majority of Mexicans in America came from farms and ranches. They grew up on horses, in boots." The best bootmakers, all the shopkeepers agree, come from Mexico, although many of the manufacturing plants -- including Lucchese, Tony Lama and Dan Post -- are in El Paso, Texas.

A boot scraper sits outside the door to Alcala's; inside, rows of boots in a rainbow of colors and multiple textures dazzle the eyes. There's scaly snakeskin, ridged hornback 'gator hide, smooth cowhide. Ostrich and anteater hide, eel and shark skin. Basically, where cowboy boots are concerned, if it holds in meat, it holds in feet.

Alcala's top-selling boots are black and brown cowhide. Wynonna-style numbers are popular with women, Alcala says, twisting a tan boot to get the fringe flying as we stand in the gal's section. Later, he grabs an eelskin pair: "That's a Sunday boot. But if you're gonna be kicking down doors, go for bullhide." Alcala claims cowboy boots are comfortable, which jars with my memories of the pair I owned as a kid. Fit is crucial, he says. And the comfort level was far worse in the past. Originally, Alcala explains, there were no left- or right-footed boots. "You would wet them, stand in a puddle, and let them dry on your feet."

Luis Alcala, Rich's father, transformed Alcala's from a general menswear store into a Western-wear-only business fifteen years ago. There's a photo of the Familia Alcala next to a special one-of-a-kind pair of Elvis boots, in the King's size, 11D. Actually, the truly king-size boots are in another display: Andre the Giant's size 28D pair, which Rich Alcala found gathering dust in an El Paso factory. Photos on the wall show celebrities who've shopped at Alcala's: Bill Murray, Ryne Sandberg and Vicente Fernandez, "the Frank Sinatra of Mexico." Ozzy Osbourne and Dwight Yoakam have visited, and John Mellencamp has shown up to buy shoe boots, cowboy boots cut off at the ankle.

Although he has a core Hispanic customer base, Rich Alcala emphasizes the diversity of his clientele. Cowboy boots are popular among African Americans, and he has a sizable gay clientele as well. "Everybody can relate to cowboy boots," he says as he fingers a pair of Alcala's house brand, in electric blue hornback alligator. "I didn't know the history of the black cowboy when I started. The first cowboys were black and Mexican," because white ranch owners needed cheap labor to move their herds.

At Alcala's, some boots go for $100, but many range up to $350. A black pair of Sam Lucchese hornback alligator goes for $3,999.99. Yet despite the sometimes-staggering prices people will pay for cowboy boots, business isn't so great these days, according to Steve Finn of Finn's Exotic Boots. For Finn, who is three credits shy of a Master's in math, boot-selling is a struggle. He's the Chicago arm of a family business that includes a manufacturing plant in El Paso run by his brother, and several other outlets around the country. Finn is the operation's sole employee in Chicago.

As he opens boxes of black rattlesnake boots, Finn rails against the sluggish Western-wear market, governmental intrusions, a proposed minimum-wage hike. He's obviously having a bad day, but the twentysomething Missouri native obliges with a mini-lesson on cowboy boots. When he walks across the hardwood floor, the sound of his green ostrich-skin boots recalls Clint Eastwood's character entering a quiet saloon in "The Unforgiven."

Most of the boots Finn sells have leather shafts, although some more-expensive styles are "full shaft," meaning that the tube around the calf is made from the same exotic hide used to cover the foot. I point out a pair of dull-orange ostrich-hide boots. Hot sellers? "Actually, those are some of my best-selling boots," Finn says. Any idea why people like 'em? "I don't know... 'cause they're really fuckin' tacky? Most folks call them orange, but that color's called 'pimento.'"

The prices at Finn's, which range between $150 and $650 a pair, don't seem to affect the people Finn refers to as "bootaphiles": owners of twenty to sixty pairs. "They want boots in all different skins, and in all the different colors," Finn says. He deals solely in exotic boots, meaning skins other than cowhide. At the moment, his clientele is mainly Hispanic and African-American. "With Hispanic customers, the core business is during the summertime," he says. Often, his Hispanic customers choose the boots "for going to dance, or cultural events."

Aside from well-known exotic skins such as snake and 'gator, Finn carries boots made from fishskin, stingray, pangolin (or anteater), ostrich hide and ostrich leg. The color varieties are infinite, since the hide dealers dye the skins before shipping them to boot manufacturers. Are all the skins dyed? "Well, yeah," he says. "You don't see a whole bunch of neon-orange ostriches running around in the African savanna."

Finn, who's stuck by himself amidst those exotic skins every day, takes special pains to encourage women to give boots a thought. "There's a little cowgirl in every girl," he says.

After a healthy dose of Finn's sarcasm, a language I know all too well, I head over to M.B. Sales, to struggle in a language I don't know at all. Under the baleful stare of a buffalo head, an M.B. staffer ushers me over to a young guy at the front counter. Vicente Suarez has worked at M.B. for seven months, and he translates questions he can't answer into Spanish for other employees to tackle. Elfego Aguilera owns M.B., which began as a men's clothing store and still carries suits along with a wide selection of cowboy hats, boots and silk shirts.

The intricately designed $60 silk shirts, black jeans and cowboy boots and hats provide the outfit de jour for young Hispanic men going dancing to banda music at the International Amphitheatre or to the rodeo at Plaza Garibaldi at 31st and Cicero. "It's not too dressy," Suarez says, "but it still looks sharp." There's ample evidence of how popular cowboy boots are in the Hispanic community, Suarez adds, "every day on the Ashland bus."

I'm tempted to slap some boots on my gringo feet, but with money tighter than a new pair of 'gatorskins, I decide instead to simply savor the memory of my M.B. favorites: white snakeskin, with the toothy head of a snake rising from the toe of each boot. Not too dressy, but they still look sharp.