You’re a grand old flag
Sunday, June 14 is Flag Day, and the first designs for the Stars and Stripes began in 1776. Congress adopted the red, white and blue flag with 13 stars June 14, 1777. President Harry S. Truman designated the day as National Flag Day in 1949.
When the Thirteen Colonies were seceding from the British, there became a necessity for a flag to symbolize the patriot cause and rally individuals for the Revolution.
The first official flag was called the Continental Colors, also known as the Grand Union Flag, which consisted of thirteen red and white stripes and the United Kingdom’s flag in the upper-left-hand corner, also known as the canton. It was the same design as the flag for the British East India Company that flew from 1701 to 1801. However, the British East India Company’s flag ranged from nine to 13 red and white stripes and was usually only flown when it was sailing in the Indian Ocean. The Continental Army flew the flag until 1777.
1776 flag
A popular belief is that Elizabeth Griscom, a Philadelphia flag maker who was also known as Betsy Ross, sewed the first official flag in June 1776. The legend goes that George Washington, Robert Morris and George Ross came to Betsy Ross’s house to discuss the design of a national flag. The original design had six-sided stars representing the 13 colonies on a field of blue with red and white stripes. She suggested a five-pointed star. The three men, amazed at how quickly she could cut the five-pointed stars, assigned her with the task of sewing the flag.
This belief originated with William J. Canby, Ross’ grandson. He presented this idea to the Historical Society of Pennsylvania in 1870 and stated that his aunt Clarissa Sydney Wilson, one of Ross’s daughters, told him the story in 1857. Ross had died twenty years prior. Today, there is no conclusive evidence supporting or denying this claim.
Francis Hopkinson, signer of the Declaration of Independence from New Jersey, claims that he designed the “Stars and Stripes” that was designated as the national flag. He was head of the Marine Committee, that had been using the red, white and blue guidelines for flags since July 4, 1776. His design may have been the six-pointed star design.
There are no records to show Hopkinson was the single creator of the design.
On June 14, 1777, the Second Continental Congress passed the first Flag Resolution. This resolution officially adopted the Stars and Stripes as the national flag and states:
“Resolved that the flag of the United States be 13 stripes alternate red and white, that the Union be 13 stars white in a blue field representing a new constellation.”
The current 50-star flag is the 27th version of the national flag.
Oh, say can you see
Here’s how our national anthem was inspired by the flag flying at Fort McHenry during the War of 1812.
Through the perilous fight?
The star-spangled banner (pictured right) that inspired Francis Scott Key to write what became our national anthem may not have flown through the night. Experts say the massive, 30-by-42-foot flag was taken down when it rained because the soaked woolen banner would be too heavy for the flagpole to hold. During the battle and stormy night, a 17-by-25-foot flag flew in its place. The larger flag was raised after the storm passed in the morning. The smaller flag is lost.
The Star Spangled Banner flag is kept at the Smithsonian Institution.
Beginning in Baltimore
Mary Pickersgill, a 37-year-old widow made the flags for Fort McHenry: She was a ship and signal flag maker. She worked seven weeks with her 13-year-old daughter, Caroline; two nieces, 13-year-old Eliza Young and 15-year-old Margaret Young; a 13-year-old African-American indentured servant, Grace Wisher; and possibly her mother, Rebecca Young, who had taught her the trade.
They laid the whole flag out on the expansive floor of a brewery near Mrs. Pickersgill’s Pratt Street house. The flags were finished on August 19, 1813.
The perilous fight
The English and French were at war since the early 1800s in Europe. The U.S. was brought into the war when the British refused to stop kidnapping U.S. sailors and forcing them into the British Navy. The U.S. declared war on Great Britain in 1812. The British had captured and burned Washington, D.C. then sailed toward Baltimore, Md.
The Battle of Baltimore saw the British bombard Fort McHenry for 25 hours beginning on Sept. 13, 1814. Estimates have 1,500 to 1,800 bombs being fired. 400 of them fell within the fort’s walls. The U.S. Army had held and stopped the British advance. There were 24 U.S. soldiers wounded and four dead.
Inspiring the poet
Francis Scott Key was a Baltimore lawyer and aboard a truce ship trying to negotiate the release of an American held prisoner. The British detained him during the battle. The next morning when he saw the U.S. flag still flying he was inspired to write his poem, “The Star Spangled Banner.”
Familiar tune
Francis Scott Key intended his poem to be sung to the tune “To Anacreon in Heaven.” Key wrote a poem in 1805 to the same tune. The music was originally written in England around 1775 and played in pubs and clubs. The original song was about a 6th-century Greek poet named Anacreon who wrote about drinking and womanizing.
Before “The Star-Spangled Banner” was adopted as the national anthem in 1931, “Yankee Doodle Dandy” was used as a traditional ceremonial song sometimes.
The national anthem has a total of four verses, but we only sing the first.
The original garrison flag (30 feet by 42 feet) covers about one-quarter of a basketball court.
Meaningful colors
There is no congressional documentation that states the colors of the flag have official meaning, but historians trace each color to have symbolic representation.
Perseverance (blue)
Valor (red)
Liberty or purity (white)
In 1795, Congress added two stripes and two stars to represent new states Kentucky and Vermont.
In 1818, Congress decreed stars should be added for each state but that the number of stripes should be capped at 13.
President William Howard Taft issued an executive order in 1912 that established a precise arrangement of the then-48 stars.
As Alaska and Hawaii neared statehood, President Dwight Eisenhower solicited opinions for a design for the 50-star flag.
Students across the country were challenged by their teachers to come up with a format for the stars. 16-year-old Robert G. Heft of Lancaster, Ohio submitted his design.
Heft’s teacher, Stanley Pratt, complained that Robert’s work was “unoriginal” and based too strongly on the existing 48-star flag. He gave Robert a B-minus on the assignment. But Robert passed his design along to his congressman and his design was eventually selected by Eisenhower.
Pratt changed Robert’s grade to an A.
“You’re a Grand Old Flag” was written by George M. Cohan for his 1906 stage musical “George Washington, Jr.” The song was introduced to the public in the play’s first act on opening night, Feb. 6, 1906, in New York’s Herald Square Theater. It was the first song from a musical to sell over a million copies of sheet music.
You’re a grand old flag lyrics
There’s a feeling comes a-stealing
And it sets my brain a-reeling
When I listen to the music of a military band
Any tune like Yankee Doodle
Simply sets me off my noodle
It’s that patriotic something
That no one can understand
We love song in the land of cotton
Melody untiring
Ain’t that inspiring?
Hurrah! Hurrah! we’ll join the jubilee
And that’s going some
For the Yankees, by gum!
Red, White and Blue
I am for you
Honest, you’re a grand old flag
You’re a grand old flag
You’re a high-flying flag
And forever in peace may you wave
You’re the emblem of
The land I love
The home of the free and the brave
Every heart beats true
Under Red, White and Blue
Where there’s never a boast or brag
But should auld acquaintance be forgot
Keep your eye on that grand old flag
You’re a grand old flag
You’re a high-flying flag
And forever in peace may you wave
You’re the emblem of
The land I love
The home of the free and the brave
Every heart beats true
Under Red, White and Blue
Where there’s never a boast or brag
But should auld acquaintance be forgot
Keep your eye on that grand old flag
I’m a cranky hanky panky
I’m a dead square honest Yankee
And I’m mighty proud of that old flag
That flies for Uncle Sam
Though I don’t believe in raiding
Every time I see it waving
There’s a chill runs up my back
That makes me glad I’m what I am
We’ve no flags but a million soldiers
That’s if we should need ’em
We’ll fight for freedom
Hurrah! Hurrah! for every Yankee bar
And old G.A.R
Every stripe, every star
Red, White and Blue
Hats off to you
Honest, you’re a grand old flag
You’re a grand old flag
You’re a high-flying flag
And forever in peace may you wave
You’re the emblem of
The land I love
The home of the free and the brave
Every heart beats true
Under Red, White and Blue
Where there’s never a boast or brag
But should auld acquaintance be forgot
Keep your eye on that grand old flag
Source: Musixmatch
Songwriters: George Cohan / Bryce Inman
Sources: Dwight D. Eisenhower Presidential Library and Boyhood Home, Smithsonian, American Battlefield Trust, National Archives, PBS, Historic Philadelphia Inc.