~ Mike Christian's
US Flag ~
You've probably seen the bumper sticker somewhere along the road. It depicts an American Flag, accompanied by the words "These colors don't run." I'm always glad to see this, because it reminds me of an incident from my confinement in North Vietnam at the Hao Lo POW Camp, or the "Hanoi Hilton," as it became known. Then a Major in the U.S. Air Force, I had been captured and imprisoned from 1967-1973. Our treatment had been frequently brutal. After three years, however, the beatings and torture became less frequent. During the last year, we were allowed outside most days for a couple of minutes to bathe. We showered by drawing water from a concrete tank with a homemade bucket.
One day as we all stood by the tank, stripped of our clothes, a young Naval pilot named Mike Christian found the remnants of a handkerchief in a gutter that ran under the prison wall. Mike managed to sneak the grimy rag into our cell and began fashioning it into a flag. Over time we all loaned him a little soap, and he spent days cleaning the material. We helped by scrounging and stealing bits and pieces of anything he could use. At night, under his mosquito net, Mike worked on the flag. He made red and blue from ground-up roof tiles and tiny amounts of ink and painted the colors onto the cloth with watery rice glue. Using thread from his own blanket and a homemade bamboo needle, he sewed on stars.
Early in the morning a few days later, when the guards were not alert, he whispered loudly from the back of our cell, "Hey gang, look here." He proudly held up this tattered piece of cloth, waving it as if in a breeze. If you used your imagination, you could tell it was supposed to be an American flag. When he raised that smudgy fabric, we automatically stood straight and saluted, our chests puffing out, and more than a few eyes had tears.
About once a week the guards would strip us, run us outside and go through our clothing. During one of those shakedowns, they found Mike's flag. We all knew what would happen. That night they came for him. Night interrogations were always the worst. They opened the cell door and pulled Mike out. We could hear the beginning of the torture before they even had him in the torture cell.
They beat him most of the night. About daylight they pushed what was left of him back through the cell door. He was badly broken; even his voice was gone. Within two weeks, despite the danger, Mike scrounged another piece of cloth and began another flag. The Stars and Stripes, our national symbol, was worth the sacrifice to him.
Now, whenever I see the flag, I think of Mike and the morning he first waved that tattered emblem of a nation. It was then, thousands of miles from home in a lonely prison cell, that he showed us what it is to be truly free.
Condensed from a speech by Leo K. Thorness, a recipient of the Medal of Honor
~ The Origin of our Flag ~
The story of the Stars and Stripes is the story of the nation itself; the evolution of the flag is symbolic of the evolution of our free institutions and their development as part of the great nation they represent.
In the early days of the Republic. when the Thirteen Original States were still British Colonies the banners borne by the Revolutionary forces were widely varied.
The local flags and colonial devices displayed in battle on land and sea during the first months of the American Revotution carried the various grievances that the individual states had against the Mother Country.
The first public reference to the flag was published on March 10, 1774. A Boston newspaper, the Massachusetts Spy, ran this poem to the flag:
"A ray of bright glory now beams from afar.
Blest drawn of an empire to rise:
The American Ensign now sparkles a star
Which shall shortly flame wide through the skies."
On June 15 1775. when General Washington had been appointed commander-in-chief of the Continental forces for the defense of American Liberty, the Continental Congress was still corresponding with King George to present their grievances.
In the fall of 1775, the revolting colonies chose aflag that reflected their feeling of unity with the Mother Country, but also expressed their demand to obtain justice and liberty.
In Taunton, MA, a flag was unfurled in 1774 which carries the British Jack in the canton and was combined with a solid red with the words, "Liberty and Union" printed on it.
The famous Rattlesnake flag carried by the Minutemen in 1775 showed thirteen red and white stripes with a rattlesnake emblazoned across it' and the warning words "Don't Tread on Me."
In 1775 the banner that flew over Fort Moultrie displayed a crescent on a blue field with the word "Liberty" printed in white. When this flag was shot down by enemy muskets a brave sergeant named Jasper nailed it back to the staff at the risk of his life.
The Pine Tree Flag which flew over the troops at Bunker Hill in 1775 displayed the pine tree symbol of the Massachusetts Bay Colony. It was a white flag with top and bottom stripe of blue and it showed a green pine tree with the words
"Liberty Tree-An Appeal to God."
The first flag or ensign to represent the colonies at sea was raised by John Paul Jones from the deck of the ship Alfred on Dec. 3, 1775. A month later George Washington displayed this same design and named it the Grand Union Flag. This was on Jan. 2nd, 1776. It had thirteen alternate red and white stripes and a blue field with the crosses of Saint Andrew and Saint George on it.
After July 4, 1776, the people of the colonies felt the need of a national flag to symbolize their new spirit of unity and independence:
'Resolved that the flag of the thirteen United States be thirteen stripes alternate red and white: that the union be thirteen stars, white on a blue field."
The significance of the colors was defined thus: "White signifies Purity and Innocence; Red, Hardiness and Valor; Blue. Vigilance, Perserverance and Justice."
Francis Hopkinson. signer of the Declaration of Independence and a member of the Continental Congress is credited with having designed the American flag.
Betsy Ross. a flag maker of Philadelphia is credited by some historians with having made the first flag and with having suggested that the stars be five-pointed.
The home of Betsy Ross at 239 Arch Street. Philadelphia. is a National Shrine and the flag flies on a staff from her third floor window. Thousands of people of all nations visit this house, which is known as the Birthplace of Old Glory.
Betsy Ross had a grandson. William J Canby who wrote in 1857 that he was told the story as a boy of eleven by his eighty-four-year old grandmother, Betsy Ross.
It is true that Betsy Ross was known as a flagmaker and that there is in the archives of the Navy an order to Elizabeth Ross "for making Ships Colors for 14 pounds 12 shillings and 2 pence, paid to her exactly two weeks before the Marine Committee's resolution of June 14th, 1777, which adopted the theme of the red and white striped Union Flag of Holland to the flag of the 13 United States of America."
Ezra Stiles, President of Yale University, recorded in his diary the resolution passed by Congress in 1777.
The Congress have substituted a new Constella of 13 stars (instead of the union) in the Continental Colors.
On May 1st. 1795, our flag was changed to 15 stripes and 15 stars with the inclusion of Vermont (1791) and Kentucky (1792) into the Union.
It was this flag that was "so gallantly streaming" over Fort McHenry when Francis Scott Key wrote The Star Spangled Banner The 15 striped. 15 starred flag was flying from 1795 to 1818.
On April 4th, 1818. Congress enacted the following law which is still in effect:
That the Flag of the United States be 13 horizontal stripes, alternate red and white, and that on the admission of every State into the Union, one star to be added on the Fourth of July next succeeding admission."
~ The Pledge of Allegiance ~
Francis Bellamy (1855-1932) wrote the Pledge for the observance of the 400th Anniversary of the discovery of America by Columbus. He was working on a journal for juveniles. called Youth's Companion. James B. Upham was the editor and they worked closely together. He went to the paper in 1891.
His job on the paper was to promote patriotism and the flying of the flag over the public schools. He was made Chairman of the executive committee for the National Public School Celebration of Columbus Day in 1892. He felt every public and private school in the land should fly the flag.
Bellamy visited President Benjamin Harrison in Washington to ask him to endorse the idea of a flag over every school house and the teaching of patriotism in all the schools. On June 21st, 1892 President Harrison signed the Proclamation that said "Let the National Flag float over every school house in the country and the exercises be such as shall impress upon our youth the patriotic duties of American citizenship!"
Francis Bellamy wrote these now famous words, first printed in Youth's Companion, Sept. 8, 1892:
"I pledge allegiance to the Flag of the United States and to the Republic for which it stands, one Nation, indivisible with liberty and justice for all."
At the second National Flag Conference held in Washington. DC. on Flag Day, 1924, they added the words "of America."
A further change was made in the Pledge by House Joint Resolution 243 approved by President Eisenhower on June 14th, 1954. This amended the language by adding the words
"under God,'' so that it now reads
"one Nation under God, indivisible, with liberty and justice for all."
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