Re: Dangling sneakers
From: Vern

I was surprised to not see one "theory" I'm familiar with. Okay, to be honest, this isn't a theory, but a fact:

When I was in high school many, many moons ago, it was common to take the shoes of the high scorer from a winning basketball game, especially a game that led us to playoffs, write the player's number on the bottom, tie them together and throw them over the power lines near the gym. It was pretty much an honor to have your shoes dangling up there. Eventually, writing the number on the bottom was stopped as kids started getting in trouble for tossing the shoes up there.

I don't know if this holds true for other areas, but in Southwestern Pennsylvania it was a common occurrence.