Ole Abe

Ole Abe has had quite the life here at Lincoln.

I have found out that Ole Abe first appeared in a 1927 Lincoln High School yearbook called the Mayflower.  The statue was made by a company called Caproni & Brothers who made thousands of plaster statues and architectural elements. I found a 1909 catalog of similar statues that sold for $50.00.  The same statue is in an elementary school in Rockport Illinois and they have had some of the same questions of where it came from.  Our statue is a replica of a bronze statue called “the Puritan” or “Standing Lincoln” at Lincoln Park in Chicago. The bronze statue was sculptured by a man named Augustus Saint-Gaudens.  That statue used the living mask made of Lincoln as the face of the statue. A scaled down bronze of the same statue resides at West Minister Abby in England.  Our statue has no beard unlike the originals which makes me wonder if it has the original head. I read the dedication of Lincoln High School which was dedicated in 1925, in that article I found out the school was named by a former teacher. (it wasn't Mr. Mercer). The article referred to a portrait of Lincoln but not a statue.  I believe the statue was purchased because I found the cleaning instructions for the statue, (To clean the statue you must first dust carefully preferably blowing off the dust with a bellows). and it was probably a massed produced item.  Maybe the class of 1927 bought it for the school.

 I e-mailed several people about the statue and here are some responses:

Anna Miller wrote-

 I called Dad (Merl Swihart) last night and here is a list of the information. 

 *The Lincoln statue was there when the school was built in probably 1922 or 1923.

*In 1957, when my dad began working at Lincoln, the head was knocked off, and they ended up keeping it in a locker for about a year.

*In 1993, the year Dad retired, he painted it with Sherwin Williams paint that he bought himself, and put the carpet around the base of it.

John McNeil wrote-

I don't know much about the statue except that it has been there for a long time. It is supposedly one of only 6 of its kind. It was once painted in a more "real" manner with flesh tones and his suit was black, etc. When it became too much to maintain, he was painted all white. Over the years, his head has been knocked off and reattached several times. At night, as you drive up Garro St. towards Lincoln you can always see Abe in the hallway, guarding the building. I am guessing that view has been there for 30-40 years minimum, maybe more as the west side was once the main entrance and the statue has always been there.

If anyone else has information about Ole Abe please let me know.

Steve Miller

LJH