Ants Kraut, member of the Estonian Heritage Society and archaeologist said that the shoes were found in 1990 during the exhumation of Konstantin Päts's remains from the hospital cemetery near Tver, Russia. The shoes had been put on Päts after his death in the hospital for burial.

"When the Estonian Heritage Society exhumed the president's remains on 22 June 1990, we collected everything present according to archaeologists' custom and took it with us; very little of the coffin remained," Kraut said. In addition to the shoes, pieces of fabric and buttons were found.

The shoes were not placed in the grave during Päts's reburial at Estonia's Metsakalmistu cemetery.

Until recently, the shoes were kept in the safe of Tallinn University's archaeology collection, Kraut said. He and a group of archaeologists took the items out of the safe after the archaeology collection moved, and he displayed them last Friday at a one‑day exhibition at the Järvamaa Muuseumi Sõprade Selts (Järvamaa Museum Friends Society) event.

"Today was a very emotional moment. Ants Kraut, who took part in exhuming Päts's remains, brought this relic to Paide today for the annual meeting of the Järvamaa Museum Friends Society. These are President Päts's shoes. They were put on the President, who died in hospital custody, instead of hospital slippers, to arrange a somewhat more dignified burial," presidential candidate hopeful Maive Rute, who attended the event, wrote on social media.

A permanent and dignified place for the items is now being sought. Kraut considers the Estonian Heads of State Museum a suitable solution, but in his view the museum would need greater support from the state and appropriate premises. "The Estonian state should have such a museum," he said.

NGO Eesti Riigivanemate Muuseum was established in 1996.

President Konstantin Päts's grandson Madis Päts said he was surprised that the shoes had been preserved. He noted that although he is not familiar with archaeological customs, in his view the shoes should have been left in the grave during the reburial.

Madis Päts's daughter expressed astonishment, questioning whether it was not improper to handle Päts's shoes in such a manner. "Isn't it rather improper to take a person's last shoes from their grave as a 'souvenir,' keep them somewhere on a home shelf (?) for over thirty years, and then put them on display for everyone to see?" she asked.

Others also raised questions about where the sneakers had been kept previously and whether they had been stored according to proper museum standards.

For example, literary scholar Aare Pilv was critical, writing on social media that Kraut kept the shoes in his own possession.

"I don't even know how else to describe it. A man who took part in exhuming President Päts's remains keeps the shoes with which the president was buried, stores them at home for over 30 years, and then brings them out at a public event attended by a current presidential candidate, who then emotionally comments that such a surprise cannot be ordered from a PR firm and that she has a lump in her throat," the post said.

President Konstantin Päts died in 1956 in a psychiatric hospital near Kalinin, present‑day Tver. His remains were found in 1990 and reburied the same October at Tallinn's Metsakalmistu.

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