The country curmudgeon: A day for celebration

By Roy Hicks
Thursday, June 11, 2009 9:55 AM PDT

This coming Sunday is Flag Day: a day for genuine celebration.

First instituted in 1916 by former President Woodrow Wilson, June 14 was declared an occasion to pay respect to our national banner and, by implication, also to pay tribute to our long and honorable tradition.

The American flag has a most interesting history. During Colonial days, American citizens were mostly loyal British subjects and proudly flew the Union Jack over their settlements. When it appeared revolution was looming, this began to change. Some of the Colonies devised their own banners. Perhaps the most famous was South Carolina’s notorious emblem of a rattlesnake with the defiant motto “Don’t Tread On Me!”

At the beginning of and all through the Revolutionary War, American sentiments were sharply divided. Support for the Revolution was never by much more than one-third of our own people. Another third remained loyal to the crown, and the remaining third was nominally uncommitted. When John Paul Jones went into battle off the coast of England, his naval flag was a striking division of old and new worlds: a Union Jack corner with the red and white stripes of the fledgling country.

Folklore declares the first American flag was commissioned by George Washington of Philadelphia seamstress Betsy Ross, who devised the original blue-and-white 13-star circle and the surrounding red and white stripes fashioned from material donated by Philadelphia ladies from their own clothes.  Whether this legend is true or not, the national banner was eventually formalized to preserve the stripes as representing the 13 original Colonies and one star to be added to the blue corner field to represent every state in the Union.

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Perhaps our flag’s proudest moment came late during the War of 1812 when the British attacked Fort McHenry. Despite a fierce naval bombardment, the fort held firm and inspired Maryland lawyer Francis Scott Key to write the immortal words of our national anthem.

What most people don’t know is there are actually three verses to the national anthem. The last one goes: “Oh, thus be it e’er, when free men shall stand/between their loved homes, and the war’s desolation./Blessed with victory and peace, may the heav’n-rescued land/praise the Power that hath made and preserved us a nation.”

One of my proudest possessions is a 38-star centennial flag that belonged to my great-grandparents. The one I most revere is the 48-star flag under which I was born and lived for my first 20 years: the flag that my grandfather and father served during both World Wars. Interestingly, no American flag is ever considered obsolete or inappropriate for public display.

This Sunday, we will celebrate Flag Day at Lions Park in Ontario. This event is sponsored and hosted by the Ontario chapter of Elks: the only fraternal organization that absolutely mandates such a national observance. Formal ceremonies will begin at 2 p.m., and the entire public is invited — nay, encouraged — to participate. Adequate comfortable seating will be provided; numerous public figures including the mayor and police chief will participate; the Elks will provide low-cost hamburgers, hot dogs and soft drinks from their mobile cook-shack; and the Boy Scouts may perform their formal ceremony of the retirement of a veteran flag.

With any luck, this ought to be a beautiful day. I’d exhort all our friends from Ontario and nearby Weiser, Emmett, Payette, Fruitland and New Plymouth to join in the observance because this is what a demonstration of genuine patriotism is all about.

Roy Hicks, a Payette resident, writes a weekly column for the Argus Observer. Comments or questions for Mr. Hicks can be directed to: Roy Hicks, Argus Observer Newsroom; 1160 S.W. Fourth St., Ontario, OR 97914