Topeka ? Anyone missing a brown shoe with porcelain buttons, last seen under the stairs at the Statehouse in the late 1800s?

Construction workers were tearing up stairs between the second and third floors of the Statehouse’s west wing last week when they unearthed the century-old attire. The work is part of a Statehouse renovation project in its seventh year and due to be completed in 2011.

“You think someone would have noticed a missing shoe,” said Laura Vannorsdel, a self-described “curator of footwear” at the Kansas Museum of History.

The shoe, of questionable fashion for today’s man, was held at the Statehouse tour guide desk until Monday, when it was transported to the history museum.

“Here’s the treasure,” said Rebecca Martin, assistant director of the museum, as she pointed to the shoe.

A right missing its left companion, it is cracked and worn, stiff from years of no moisture. It appears to be beaten down from the neglect.

At the history museum, Martin and Vannorsdel went to work to solve the mystery, inspecting the sole and buttons.

Old catalogs and microfiche were brought out to aid in the process, and there it was – or at least something similar – buried in a catalog from A.J. Cammeyer, a major shoe retailer of the time.

“Men’s low button shoe, hand sewed with a broad plain toe,” read the booklet.

It retailed for $4 and came in sizes 5 to 10. This particular shoe’s size was undetermined, but a purely unscientific comparison to another shoe indicated the man’s foot at somewhere around an 8.

“This could have been a workman’s shoe, possibly,” Vannorsdel said.

Joe Brentano, a Statehouse tour guide, said construction began on the west wing in 1879 and it was in use by 1881.

The shoe isn’t the only item found at the Statehouse by construction workers. Earlier this year, an old trowel was found. When the renovation is completed, there will be an exhibit of Statehouse-related finds.

“The shoe might find its way into that, who knows?” Martin said.