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The Auditor General, James Milligan, and the Chamber of Accounts, investigated his claim and noted that Hopkinson was not the only person on the Navy Committee or the three Great Seal committees, so he should not singularly be called out and compensated for his work. There are no surviving illustrations of his design, but the flag most likely has 13 red and white stripes, and 13 six-pointed stars in a field of blue. Myth and romance came in to play when – so the story goes – in August 1777, reinforcements sent to save besieged Fort Schuyler, New York, cut up white shirts, the red petticoats of officers’ wives and the blue cloth coat of Captain Abraham Swartwout to make an early Stars and Stripes. A step toward a code of etiquette for the display and treatment of the flag was taken in 1923, but another nineteen years elapsed before the first Federal Flag Code (Public Law 829; Chapter 806) was enacted in 1942. It recognized the existence of the Pledge of Allegiance, which had been introduced (by the Reverend Francis Bellamy, a socialist!) into the public schools beginning in 1892; the words “under God” were added in 1954, at the height of the Cold War with Russia.
- The current flag of the United States is the twenty-seventh version of the national flag.
- Between 1776 and 1782, three successive Congressional committees worked on a design for a Great Seal of the United States.
- The flag was created as an item of military equipment to identify U.S. ships and forts.
- When, on 1 January 1776, Washington’s Continental Army was mustered formally on Prospect Hill (Mount Pisgah) in Somerville, Massachusetts, it was under this flag favoured by the American general during the previous year’s Siege of Boston.
- On Memorial Day, it is common to place small flags by war memorials and next to the graves of U.S. war veterans.
- Section 176-j of the Code as amended by Congress on 7 July 1976, states that “The flag represents a living country and is itself considered a living thing.” With that declaration, the apotheosis of the American flag would seem to be virtually complete.
Lewis’ and Clark’s American Flag
Complete separation from the Crown and the United Kingdom was not necessarily a fait accompli as Americans took up arms in 1775. When, on 1 January 1776, Washington’s Continental Army was mustered formally on Prospect Hill (Mount Pisgah) in Somerville, Massachusetts, it was under this flag favoured by the American general during the previous year’s Siege of Boston. John Paul Jones, the first well-known American admiral raised the Grand Union Flag at sea in December 1775.
World War II
The Confederacy produced a wide range of flags, although the best known is based either on the Second Confederate Navy Jack or the Battle Flag of Northern Virginia. The Southern Cross is a reminder of how the course of US history might have been very different. And, although they cannot ignore the rulings of the US Supreme Court, laws in Florida, Georgia, Louisiana, Mississippi and South Carolina protect the Confederate flag from mutilation, defamation and contempt. In those early days when the US flag had yet to be established, many featured red, white and blue stripes. The most famous of these is the Serapis flag of 1779 flown from the captured British frigate of that name by US Captain John Paul Jones. When Jones sailed her, flagless and in need of repair, into the island port of Texel, run by the neutral Dutch United Provinces, British officials declared the Serapis a pirate ship.
Great Seal of the United States
Based, perhaps, on knowledge of a letter from Benjamin Franklin and John Adams of 3 October 1778 to Ferdinand I of the Two Sicilies describing the American flag as consisting of “13 stripes, alternately red, white and blue”, Jones had such a design run up. During this time, other flags were flown to show support for Independence. This flag depicts a rattlesnake with the phrase “DONT TREAD ON ME” in a field of yellow. The Continental Marines used the Gadsden Flag during the early years of the war and the flag still flies today as a sign of American patriotism. Other organizations that wear flag patches on their uniforms can have the flag facing in either direction. The flag is customarily flown year-round at most public buildings, and it browse patriotic flags collection is not unusual to find private houses flying full-size (3 by 5 feet (0.91 by 1.52 m)) flags.
and 50-star unions
In North American exploration the overriding desire was to find and map the legendary waterway through the continent, which Thomas Jefferson was convinced would consist of an interlocking of the Missouri and Columbia Rivers, separated at their headwaters by a short portage. If there really was a transcontinental waterway between the Atlantic and Pacific oceans, and if it were viable for large boats, it would provide the fastest and cheapest imaginable route between the major markets of Europe and those of the Orient. Moreover, the discovery would endow the nation with unlimited opportunities by launching it into the orbit of global power and influence. He published it in his newspaper, the Pennsylvania Gazette, on 9 May 1754, along with an editorial supporting the need for the “present disunited State of the British Colonies” to join together for their own survival in order to resist the efforts of French and Indian militants to control the land west of the Appalachians. As if to test the truth of the old superstition about the revivability of reptiles, the image was restored for various purposes throughout the post-Revolutionary Era and even, with suitable emendations, on both sides during the Civil War. With this little sketch he created one of the first political cartoons in American journalism.
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. The above resolution was adopted from the Marine Committee, who had been using these guidelines for flags since July 4, 1776. Francis Hopkinson was chairman of the Navy Board’s Middle Department which was under the Marine Committee at the time that these guidelines were established in 1776. On May 25, 1780, he requested a quarter cask of wine in payment for his help in designing the national flag and aiding in designing the Great Seal for the United States.
Century-old Olympics footage brought back to life
The current flag has discover more patriotic gifts here fifty stars and has remained unchanged since Alaska and Hawaii entered the Union in 1959. The current flag of the United States is the twenty-seventh version of the national flag. 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. U.S. flags are displayed continuously at certain locations by presidential proclamation, acts of Congress, and custom. Every U.S. astronaut since the crew of Gemini 4 has worn the flag on the left shoulder of their space suits, except for the crew of Apollo 1, whose flags were worn on the right shoulder. Several government websites have given Pantone (PMS) equivalents for the flag colors.
Display and use
And if you liked this story, sign up for the weekly bbc.com features newsletter, called “If You Only Read 6 Things This Week”. A handpicked selection of stories from BBC Future, Earth, Culture, Capital and Travel, delivered to your inbox every Friday. Flown from the masts of American warships, the Pine Tree flag was a powerful symbolic riposte to the Crown and its Royal Navy. A lone pine was shown on a white background with the inscription “An Appeal find more flags for patriots to Heaven” (“An Appeal to God” was a less common alternative). These words were taken from the British philosopher John Locke’s Second Treatise on Civil Government (1690), which refuted the notion of the Divine Right of Kings. Those 13 stripes and 50 stars make up one of the world’s most familiar symbols.