[Terry M. Hunt]

Pulled the wheel and drum. Wheel cylinder and axle seal completely dry, but brake shoes clearly had an issue(see photo attached). Inner edge of both shoes contaminated by brake fluid. Once I saw this, I recalled something that happened last summer when replacing the master cylinder.
While gravity bleeding the left rear I set up the bleed hose and routed it into a small jar while the car was up on my drive on lift. Went inside for lunch and when I came back I discovered the bleeder hose had popped off the bleeder fitting. Fluid had run down the backing plate and about 1/2 ounce was puddled up where the tire was in contact with the lift runway. I cleaned all this up and finished the bleeding process.
I think what I failed to realize was that as this fluid reached the bottom of the backing plate, a small amount was able to curl around the edge of the backing plate. From there I guess it got picked up by the edge of the drum and somehow distributed around the inner edge of the shoes.
Anyway, installed new shoes and all seems fine after a short test drive. Thanks for all the responses.