We might hang those 'W' flags after a Cubs win, but that's not what they originally signified.

I've been a Cubs fan my whole life, but it wasn't until a few years ago that I started to notice Cubs 'W' flags hanging around my parents neighborhood.

Sure, that's in part because the Cubs sucked for most of my life, but it also wasn't trendy to own those 'W' flags.

Now, after a Cubs win, it's hard to drive around Illinois without seeing one. But where did they come from?

I had no idea of the backstory behind those 'W' flags until I read this article this morning from NBC.

Oh.... the 'W' didn't originally stand for 'win,' it stood for 'Wilmington.'

If you're a Cubs fan, you know about the Wrigley family, the namesake of Wrigley field.

Well, way back when the Wrigley family owned the team, they ferried fans to California to watch spring training. They used their company, Wilmington Transport to do so, and on the side of the ship, there was a 'W' flag.

That flag was reversed from the ones we use now, with the letter being white and the flag being blue.

The flag began being used at games when the scoreboard was built but remained the original version of blue flag and white letters until the 1980, when the Cubs began retiring players' numbers and hanging those flags as well.

So the next time you forget to take your 'W' flag down after a devastating loss like last night, just tell your neighbors that you're representing 'Wilmington Transport.'

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