Circa 1938, originally featured in Mechanix Illustrated. From Modern Mechanix via Gimcrack, which is frequently NSFW. Those are some serious old lady shoes!
You can see this very shoe tester in action at the Exploratorium museum in San Francisco. It's a little bit hidden: if you go to the second floor, and then look over towards the back of the museum, on top of the labs, it's right there -- and they even have its speed control exposed, so you can make it go faster or slower :-D
ooops.... I didn't realise this was from modern mechanix, I found it somewhere else a long time ago. I think the Rain Dears image came from the same place but it was so long ago that I've lost the link.
my apologies to modern mechanix, I'll check there before posting similar things again
my apologies to modern mechanix, I'll check there before posting similar things again