Deanne Fitzmaurice/The Chronicle

Outrage over the flattening of what was believed to be the world’s largest shoe tree has now swept through the Nevada desert and drawn the attention of federal and local gumshoes.

Vandals chain-sawed the landmark down Dec. 30, and at first the reaction was confined to Middlegate, Nev., a smattering of houses and a gas station-eatery about 100 miles east of Reno. Middlegate squats alongside Highway 50, dubbed “the loneliest road in America,” and aside from giving high-desert travelers from the Bay Area and all other points east and west a mealtime respite from snow or scorching sun, its biggest attraction has long been the giant cottonwood tree just beyond the edge of town.

That tree, standing about 70 feet high, had bristled since the mid-1980s with thousands of shoes of all kinds flung into the branches by passers-by and who knows who else. But now, thanks to a chain-saw’s teeth, it lies prone in a ditch, its well-worn artwork reunited with the ground.

When word of the deed reached the U.S. Bureau of Land Management and the Churchill County Sheriff’s Office this week, they assembled a team of investigators to find the bad guys.

Don’t laugh. This was more than just weird wood with shoes. It was on bureau land, making it federal property and its destruction a federal offense.

“It was the only shady spot in the road, and you know how important that is here in Nevada where there’s not a lot of shelter out there,” bureau spokesman Mark Struble told The Chronicle. “But it wasn’t just good shade for drivers, it was a great wildlife habitat. Songbirds and other animals really used it.”

With the shoe tree gone, the only other scenery on that stretch of Highway 50 is distant mountaintops, gray scrub and pavement stretching so far away the road seems to vanish. Locals are stumped as to who could have so little appreciation for the marriage of footwear and nature.

“A lot of people are pretty mad and wondering what could possibly be the motive,” bartender Greg Stevenson said. “We get people here from all over the world to see the shoe tree. It was good for business.”

No longer will little kids be able to gawk at the tennis shoes, sandals, ballet slippers, cowboy boots, Rollerblades, and so forth hanging amid the leaves. No longer will grown-ups be able to salute the flags draped over branches. No longer will anyone be able to gape at the bras, underpants and other nearly unmentionables, not to mention plastic bottles stuffed with dollar bills, tacked high up on the trunk.

It was already a lonely drive. But sole-less?

Heavy sigh.

The town plans a memorial at the site on Feb. 13.