Steve Fullerton Keeps Shoeshine Tradition Alive at Cook County Building

On March 25, 2026, Steve Fullerton continued his daily ritual beneath the vaulted marble ceiling of the Cook County Building, tending to leather shoes and preserving a fading downtown trade. For the past 20 years the 57-year-old West Side resident has set up each morning at 8:30 a.m., keeping his tools in a tall wooden box, playing R&B on a radio and offering a focused, roughly 15-minute shine for a $10 fee.

Fullerton’s clientele has ranged from routine courthouse visitors to well-known figures — he has worked on shoes tied to names such as Magic Johnson (size 14), former Mayor Lori Lightfoot (size 8) and perennial candidate Willie Wilson (size 11). Regulars and county employees praise him: Charlotte McGill, 63, who works in the property tax department, calls him family, and Cook County Commissioner John Daley has paused to exchange greetings. Lightfoot has said she learned to shine shoes from her father and found the experience therapeutic; Fullerton says he protects his techniques and uses saddle soap and an Angelus-brand polish as part of his process.

Business has thinned since he began — from as many as 50 pairs a day to sometimes fewer than 10 as footwear trends and the pandemic reduced demand — leaving standalone shoeshiners increasingly rare. Still, Fullerton keeps his chair ready each morning, arguing that caring for shoes reflects broader habits of self-respect and steady work, a modest craft persisting amid downtown change.