Old Abe, the steam- and coal-powered tractor that became a staple in parades and events across Southwest Colorado in the 1960s and ’70s, will be auctioned off this weekend in the estate sale of lifelong Durango resident Jack Newbold.
The steam tractor was built by Jack using an 1898 steam engine found on the edge of a field and a boiler from a laundromat that was going out of business, his son, Keith Newbold, said.
“Back in the 1960s and ’70s, he was taking it all around to a lot of mountain communities for the Fourth of July parades, and then he would have it out in Mancos, and Bayfield and different places,” he said.
The tractor was also a common sight at Durango’s Fiesta Days parade, previously known as the “Spanish Trails Fiesta.” Keith, who is now in his 70s, rode the tractor with his father from as young as age 10. He would ring the bell and help shovel coal during parades and events.
Jack, who became a bit of a celebrity in his own right for his collection of valuable old-timey items, made appearances in Rolling Rock beer commercials in the late-1980s and early 1990s alongside Old Abe, Keith said.
“(Rolling Rock’s) motto at the time was, ‘We do it the old-fashioned way,’ or something,” he said.
The tractor has always held monetary value, Keith said – but Jack was never interested in selling.
A hopeful buyer – a Case Tractors dealer from Texas – offered Jack a brand-new Cadillac in 1965 in exchange for Old Abe, Keith said; but Jack declined.
The exact starting bid for the tractor, which will be up for auction Saturday morning, hadn’t been set as of Thursday. But the ballpark will likely be in the thousands, according to auction and estate staff members.
The family’s hope is that the tractor will be bought by the Durango & Silverton Narrow Gauge Railroad and be featured in the D&SNG museum on Main Avenue.
“I just hope it goes to someone who’s going to display it,” Devin Newbold, Jack’s grandson, said. “It’s been hiding in the shop for so many years.”
Jack, despite having only an eighth grade education, which he received from the Old Fort, was an accomplished self-taught engineer who built and refurbished many vehicles and other items, and garnered a reputation as a sharpshooter among the Durango community.
“Both of his older brothers went away to World War II, and one of them was killed in action, and the other one never came back, so he had to step up when he should have been going to school,” Keith said. “He was happy to take care of the old folks. He was working on stuff like this, figuring it out, since he was a kid. He just had a knack. He just had that ‘it’ factor.”
A NASA engineer once consulted Jack when he was stuck on an engineering problem, Keith said – one of many mechanical professionals who would come to Jack for help throughout his life.
“The guy literally was a rocket scientist, having problems with an engineering issue, even though that’s what he did, and somebody said, ‘If anybody can figure it out, Jack Newbold can,’” he said. “He came up here (to the shop), and my dad said, ‘Well, what you need to do is this, this and this.’”
When he wasn’t restoring steam engines and antique tractors, Jack was involved in a range of business ventures and jobs over the course of his life. He worked as a firefighter with the Durango Fire Department for five years, was a founding board member of Animas Fire Protection District, and owned and operated several area businesses with wife Jolene, including Welding Service and Supply, Cottonwood Camper Park, Hermosa Gravel Products and Newbold Firewood.
Pat Story, who runs Hesperus-based Treasure Auction Services with Calvin Story, said going through the extensive estate has been like a treasure hunt.
“As you go through (Jack’s) belongings, you start to learn how he thought,” she said. “And he was a genius.”
Along with the tractor, the auction will feature a range of antiques, collectibles and oddities from Jack’s and late wife Jolene’s collection, including a Bobcat Mod 763 Skidsteer; a wood-burning shop stove; a sorghum press; a 1994 Dodge Ram 1500 V8 Mag Single Cab; a bee smoker; a VW Jeep; a Honda 600 Project Car and a Bachman Climax 97 Incline two-man steam-powered parade engine, which Jack built from scratch.
The Bachman traveled from Antonita to Chama, New Mexico, on the Cumbres and Toltec Railroad, Keith said.
Jack died in 2014, and Jolene in 2021 – but this year felt like the right time to hold the auction, Keith said.
“It’’ just time,” he said. “I mean, my dad died in (2014), my mom died in 2021, and there’s just so much stuff.”
Jack stopped bringing Old Abe to parades and events around 2006, when the state began requiring pricey boiler inspections – and residents noticed its absence.
“(The tractor) was very well-received by a lot of people,” Keith said. “When he stopped running it in parades, people were calling him and saying, ‘Jack, why isn’t it in the parade anymore?’”
Though Old Abe has been dormant in Jack’s shop for the last 20 years, Keith is confident the tractor will be fit as a fiddle after being cleaned and given a good oiling.
It will be bittersweet seeing Old Abe and the rest of his parent’s collection sell, he said.
“It’s going to be good to get things wound down,” he said. “But you know, I’m 70 years old now, and I spent my whole lifetime watching (my dad) collect stuff. … He wanted to set up a museum, and, you know, he just kind of ran out of time.”