When 3-spring brake kits weren't available

[Hoxviii]

This might be a regional question, but it's also a time-based question.

I have a 57 sedan that was restored circa 1993 and I'm currently putting brakes on it. The PO had installed 58+ rear shoes and 2 spring hardware kits, which is doable if you grind the brake shoe ears down in width where they enter the adjuster - I know this because I did it on who knows how many dune buggies in the mid-late 1990s.

Here's the question:
I'm going back to 3 spring brakes since the springs and shoes are available today. Around 1995, in the Midwest we were using 58 shoes and hardware because 57 minus shoes and hardware simply weren't available.

In this time frame, were 54-57 brake parts simply unavailable, or were they available in places like California but not anywhere else being generally pre-widespread internet usage and you only had what the paper catalog offered?

I'm also asking this because there are SO MANY parts available repro today that I would have killed for last time I did an oval beetle - but fortunately this one doesn't need too much.

[Hoxviii]

So no one has been messing with ovals long enough to remember 2-bolt brake cylinders being a "rebuild only" option?

I'm not that old, I just want to know when oval parts really became available to everyone.

For example, I tracked down a set of pre-58 wiper bases and arms around Y2K - afyer having spent 5 years even looking for a set for sale. Today? Have the cash? They're out there, some where -