When I was in college around 1969 I was a scholarship track athlete. We were issued a pair of spikes and flats. The only two brands that I was aware of were Adidas and Puma. There was one other high quality brand, Riddell which mostly made ripple sole coaches shoes.
I worked at a Summer retreat in the Western Carolina Mountains. There was a huge staff, over 400 college students during the Summer.
As it turned out there were two other track athletes on the staff and we all wore our flats for every day wear. No one else was. Within a couple of years everything changed.
By 1973 most of the staff were wearing them and a few other brands were being sold. The new ones were Onitsuka (Tigers) and Spot Bilt which all the weight men wore.
About the same time you began to see rip offs made it Taiwan etc. The quality of these falsies as we called them was awful. None of the athletes would have been caught dead wearing them.
Now that has changed. You can get off brands or no name brands made in China which are first class.
I buy $12 faded glory sneakers from walmart-
I began buying Nike trainers in 1971, in Eugene, Or. The sales staff of Nike Store #2(?) were all Oregon track athletes. I was on a local high school track team, so of course I bought Nikes. They had the best shoe for combatting shin splints and achiles tendon problems I knew of; the original Cortez.