{"id":28589,"date":"2021-02-01T20:42:27","date_gmt":"2021-02-01T20:42:27","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/one.sightlinemg.com\/navytimes\/uncategorized\/2021\/02\/01\/its-navys-badger-statue-but-wisconsin-has-grown-attached\/"},"modified":"2026-08-08T19:10:20","modified_gmt":"2026-08-08T19:10:20","slug":"its-navys-badger-statue-but-wisconsin-has-grown-attached","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/one.sightlinemg.com\/navytimes\/news\/your-navy\/2021\/02\/01\/its-navys-badger-statue-but-wisconsin-has-grown-attached\/","title":{"rendered":"It\u2019s Navy\u2019s badger statue, but Wisconsin has grown attached"},"content":{"rendered":"\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\">MADISON, Wis. \u2014 The Wisconsin badger statue that has served as a literal touchstone for so many Capitol building visitors that they\u2019ve rubbed the finish off his nose could be headed to another den soon.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\">Navy officials want the statue they loaned to the state more than 30 years ago back. But state historians aren\u2019t letting it go without a fight.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\">The badger is synonymous with Wisconsin. It was selected as the state\u2019s official animal because lead miners in the state\u2019s early days were said to burrow into the ground like badgers. The University of Wisconsin-Madison\u2019s athletic teams are known as the Badgers, the school\u2019s mascot is a sassy badger named Bucky and an image of a badger adorns the state flag (although he looks more like a short-tailed beaver than a badger to the untrained eye).<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\">Replicas of badgers can be found throughout the state Capitol. But the Badger and Shield statue holds a special place of honor outside the governor\u2019s office.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\">The statue was crafted around 1899 from melted-down cannons taken from Cuba during the Spanish-American War, according to online travel guide Atlas Obscura. It was affixed to the USS Wisconsin battleship before World War I.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\">It spent more than 60 years in a <a href=\"https:\/\/www.navytimes.com\/news\/your-navy\/2019\/05\/20\/naval-academy-plebes-finish-annual-monument-climb\/\" target=_blank>U.S. Naval Academy<\/a> garden before the academy museum loaned it to Wisconsin in 1988 for a state historical society exhibition that coincided with the recommissioning of the second USS Wisconsin, which was built in Philadelphia. After the exhibition ended, the statue was put outside the governor\u2019s Capitol office in 1989. It has stood there ever since.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\">The building has been closed to the public for nearly a year because of the coronavirus pandemic, but the statue has been a highlight of tours in recent years, with throngs of adults and children rubbing its nose for good luck. So many people have touched the nose that its bright brassy gleam stands in sharp contrast to the rest of the statue.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\">State Department of Administration officials said the naval academy\u2019s museum contacted them last March about returning the statue so that it could be displayed at the Nauticus Museum in Norfolk, Virginia, where the second USS Wisconsin is now an exhibit. The Nauticus Museum is run by a nonprofit, not the Navy. Messages left at the museum weren\u2019t returned.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\">The Naval Academy museum extended the loan through mid-September due to COVID-19-related closures. Christian Overland, the head of the Wisconsin Historical Society, wrote a letter to Claude Berube, the naval academy museum\u2019s director, in October asking for a two-year extension on the loan.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\">Overland said the pandemic has driven up shipping costs and that the society uses the statue to help tell Wisconsin children about <a href=\"https:\/\/www.navytimes.com\/news\/your-navy\/2018\/04\/13\/new-uss-indianapolis-to-be-christened-at-wisconsin-shipyard\/\" target=_blank>the state\u2019s ship-making history<\/a> and its role in Great Lakes commerce.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\">\u201cThe children on the tours become very engaged and excited to learn more about the history of the ship industry in our state and in their communities,\u201d Overland wrote. \u201cIt would be wonderful to continue telling and sharing stories of the USS Wisconsin and waterway history of our great state as we keep moving forward.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\">State Department of Administration spokeswoman Molly Vidal said that as of Monday, the state hadn\u2019t heard back from the museum about extending the loan.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\">Berube said in a phone interview Thursday that he never received the letter, but that the museum has to take back the statue. He noted that the original loan was for five years and has been repeatedly extended to more than 30 years.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\">Berube said permanent loans no longer exist in the museum industry, and though he understands how Wisconsin feels, it\u2019s now another organization\u2019s turn to benefit from displaying the badger. He also noted that the academy museum had to return former President Jimmy Carter\u2019s plebe uniform to his museum in 2019.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\">\u201cLoans are done in good faith,\u201d he said. \u201cI think it\u2019s great that children have been able to see this badger while it was on loan. Now we\u2019re trying to accommodate another facility that has also requested it. There will be a lot of children in the Norfolk area who will be able to enjoy it as well.\u201d<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>Navy officials want the statue they loaned to the state more than 30 years ago back. But state historians aren\u2019t letting it go without a fight.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":7,"featured_media":57308,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_acf_changed":false,"_yoast_wpseo_meta-robots-noindex":"","_yoast_wpseo_meta-robots-nofollow":"","_yoast_wpseo_canonical":"","_acf":"","_yoast_wpseo_primary_category":65,"_jetpack_feature_clip_id":0,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paid_content":false,"footnotes":"","_smg_distribution_targets":{"2":{"categories":["your-military","news"],"primary_category":"your-military"}}},"categories":[101,12,26,65],"tags":[],"coauthors":[2978],"class_list":["post-28589","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-daily-news-roundup","category-news","category-newsletters","category-your-navy"],"acf":{"subheadline":"","legacy_arc_id":"Q3Z3B3V2QBF6HEM7KMH3UNNTDM","arc_canonical_url":"\/news\/your-navy\/2021\/02\/01\/its-navys-badger-statue-but-wisconsin-has-grown-attached\/","remove_feature_photo":false,"is_sponsored":false,"subtype":"","redirect_url":"","disable_inline_ads":false,"native_logo_pretext":"Presented By:"},"yoast_head":"<!-- This site is optimized with the Yoast SEO Premium plugin v26.0 (Yoast SEO v28.1) - https:\/\/yoast.com\/product\/yoast-seo-premium-wordpress\/ -->\n<title>It\u2019s Navy\u2019s badger statue, but Wisconsin has grown attached - Navy Times<\/title>\n<meta name=\"description\" content=\"Navy officials want the statue they loaned to the state more than 30 years ago back. 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