shoe leather

Noun

shoe-leather (countable and uncountable, plural shoe-leathers)

1. Leather that is used to make shoes.
   • Outside of patent leathers and specialties, I know of no other types of shoe leathers which are commanding replacement costs today.1922, Boot and Shoe Recorder: The Magazine of Fashion Footwear, volume 81, Philadelphia, Pa.: King Publications (a subsidiary of Chilton Company), →OCLC, page 86
2. (uncountable) Leather from which shoes are made that is worn out through walking.
   • In old times, if a Coniston peasant had any business at Ulverstone, he walked to Ulverstone; spent nothing but shoe-leather on the road, drank at the streams, and if he spent a couple of batz when he got to Ulverstone, "it was the end of the world." But now, he would never think of doing such a...1874 June 6, John Ruskin, “Letter XLIV”, in Fors Clavigera. Letters to the Workmen and Labourers of Great Britain, volume IV, Orpington, Kent: George Allen, →OCLC, pages 166–167
3. (broadly, idiomatic) The sweat of one's brow; effort; investigatory effort.
   • They expended a lot of shoe-leather in hunting down every lead.
4. (derogatory, figuratively, slang) Tough meat, especially cheap meat.
   • The school certainly wasn't breaking the bank by feeding us — when it wasn't gruel it was shoe-leather.

See all 5 meanings of shoe-leather