In the things I did not know department but learned at a museum: Likeness of famous Civil War eagle Old Abe was used as logo on Case farming threshers

Tour guide Oro Ball, closeup of eagle logo (Picket photos) and the real Old Abe in 1870s

After an embarrassingly long time without having paid a visit, I traveled with a church group Thursday to the Southeastern Railway Museum in Duluth, Ga. It did not disappoint: Inside and outside are an amazing array of railroad engines, boxcars, cabooses, schedule boards, crew uniforms and much more. We even took a short train ride on a side track.

I was pleasantly surprised to see a collection of commercial and transit buses toward the back.

But what really got my attention near that area was a 1906 Case traction steam engine with a bald eagle embossed on its boiler. 

Tour guide Oro Ball explained the logo depicted Old Abe from the Civil War. I instantly thought of the 8^th Wisconsin Volunteer Infantry, which carried the mascot in three dozen battles and skirmishes, including Vicksburg and Corinth, Ms., according to tradition and records.

Honestly, I had no idea Old Abe was the logo of J.I. Case and Company for nearly 75 years and was a fixture on farm equipment across the country.

Old Abe was just weeks old in 1861 when a Chippewa Indian took him from a nest in northern Wisconsin. The bird was subsequently traded to an individual and it ended up with Company C of the Eau Claire Badgers, which later became part of the 8^th Wisconsin.

This was about the time Jerome Increase Case, a native of New York, was in Eau Claire on business.

“Company C was on parade, and the eagle’s cry could be heard over the drums. Mr. Case asked a boy where the bird had come from, and he told him Old Abe’s story. Case immediately determined to make Old Abe his business trademark as soon as the war was over,” according to an article in The Post-Journal in Jamestown, N.Y.

(Civil War Picket photo)

Old Abe quickly became a darling of Union troops in the field, who saw his as a symbol of freedom and bravery.

“A perch was built for him of shield shape, with the stars and stripes painted thereon, to which he is attached by a small rope, giving him liberty of his limbs and wings for a distance of several yards,” says the Wisconsin Historical Society. “He became an inspirational symbol to the troops, akin to a ceremonial flag carried by each regiment.”

Col. Rufus Dawes of the Iron Brigade recalled, "Our eagle usually accompanied us on the bloody field, and I heard [Confederate] prisoners say they would have given more to capture the eagle of the Eighth Wisconsin, than to take a whole brigade of men."

After the war, Old Abe lived in the state Capitol and was used for fund-raising efforts. He died in 1881 from smoke inhalation after a fire.

Click to read sign about Old Abe (Picket photo), at right, J.I. Case

As for Case, he got his big start in Racine, Wis., in the early 1840s and he produced threshers and his first steam engine tractor in 1869. Old Abe was adopted as the company trademark in 1865, at war’s end, and it was in use until 1969.

Over time, a globe replaced a branch in Abe's claws and cast iron eagle statues were placed in buildings where Case did business.

The steam engine on display in Duluth is a Case 110 model made in 1906. This was an early form of what would become a tractor. A version in the Manitoba Agricultural Museum in Canada says they were designed for “heavy plowing, threshing and freighting – for all kinds of work necessitating a large amount of horsepower.”

The farm equipment company is known today as Case IH.

And now I know the rest of the story.