Later, Snapple caps and pencils. But his true romance was always Nike sneakers. From the time he was in fifth grade, he wanted Air Jordans, but they were too expensive for his family to buy. As soon as he was financially independent, he bought his first pair. Geller says he loves Nikes more than anything else in the world.
He notes that his first and middle names are Michael Jordan reversed, and that the randomly assigned number he received when he passed the California State Bar exam after law school, , combined the two jersey numbers 23 and 45 Jordan made famous.
But Geller says he is done collecting now. Although he's been able to support himself with his shoe collection, it also represents a dark underbelly of obsession. Definitely crazy. Because I'm wired to be like that, so all or nothing—I can't even dabble in buying shoes," he says.
We are sitting in a seemingly unused conference room on the bottom floor of his luxury apartment building along Couch Park, where he now lives with his wife, Natalie.
But at one point he had to rent an entire apartment in Las Vegas solely to store his shoes. Geller knew that owning a pair of every shoe Nike ever made was near impossible, but figured he could own enough of them to accurately curate their history. For a year and a half, Geller says, he was obsessed—a word he often uses to describe himself. I didn't tell one person what I was doing because I thought that people would think it's insane," he says.
Nylon footwear uppers were air-freighted from Japan. Bowerman's waffle outsoles were hand-cut from rolls of rubber sheets made in Eugene. Geoff Hollister glued them together and then gave them to a dozen or so competitors to wear for training or on the infield at Hayward Field. The hand-cobbled footwear quickly picked up the nickname "Moon Shoe" because the waffle-marked footprints they left in the dirt were reminiscent of those being left on the moon around the same time by the Apollo astronauts.
Those early prototypes were crude, but runners liked the feel and traction of the waffle sole, which would lead to the development of the iconic Nike Waffle Trainer in The Moon Shoe is featured on Page 1. Moon Shoes are the roots of Nike. Nike Moon Shoe Collection. That knowledge sparked an idea: Why not create a shoe museum, a place where people who had grown up coveting Air Jordans or the latest and coolest kicks -- just as he had -- could see them all in one place?
He stopped selling shoes at the end of -- putting enough money aside to see him through this ShoeZeum crusade. Where it goes, he's not sure. Few people have actually seen the collection. It hasn't been open to the public and there's no sign on the warehouse that would lure visitors. Seven Nike executives came down in March for a tour, some reporters for sneaker websites have visited sneakernews. After July, Geller's lease runs out on the warehouse. Step inside Geller's giant shoe box and you're greeted first by his little dog, Guinness, and then by the sight of a large, orange "Just Do It" banner hanging over racks of shoes surrounded by poster-covered walls.
Geller doesn't know the exact number of shoes in the ShoeZeum -- he says it's more than 2, -- or their combined worth. He claims it's "a million-dollar" collection but says he'd never sell it. All but a few are shrink-wrapped for protection. Geller has every Air Jordan model ever released, including those from his forgettable Washington Wizards era, arrayed in chronological order.
It's the shoe Geller says is responsible for his obsession with Nike. His dad was a marathoner and "roped me into this, taking me to sneaker stores" to marvel at the Air's revolutionary, visible air bubbles. Not every Nike shoe is represented; just the ones Geller believes are notable or innovative. Andre Agassi's colorful tennis line sits next to the bland, white shoes of his rival, Pete Sampras, but the shoes face away from each other. Prefontaine was going to wear this model in the Olympics, but died in a car accident in This pair, slightly worn but not by Prefontaine , was found in an abandoned storage locker in New Mexico.
Every day, the ShoeZeum grows. Geller searches for new shoes and ponders his next steps. But, he's all in.
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