The original star-spangled banner-which, as of the Flag Act of 1974, had 15 stars and stripes, for the addition of Vermont and Kentucky into the Union as the 14th and 15th states, respectively-flew over Fort McHenry during the Battle of Baltimore is now kept at the Smithsonian National Museum of American History. Spangled means decorated with brights objects, as stars, hence star-spangled. You know it as “The Star-Spangled Banner.”īanner, of course, refers to the flag. Key would reuse that star-spangled line when he penned “Defence of Fort M’Henry” in 1814 while witnessing the fort being bombarded by the British during the War of 1812: “Oh say does that star spangled banner yet wave/o’er the land of the free & the home of the brave.” That poem, also set to the tune of “To Anacreon in Heaven,” became the official national anthem of the United States in 1931. The song was set to “To Anacreon in Heaven,” a kind of drinking song of an 18th-century London gentleman’s club, and included the lines: “And pale beamed the crescent, its splendor obscured / By the light of the star-spangled flag of our nation.” In 1805, amateur poet Francis Scott Key wrote a song to commemorate the American battle in Tripoli during the First Barbary War. And by the 20th century, the name Old Glory had become synonymous with the American flag in general. Today, the original Old Glory is held at the Smithsonian Museum of American History. During the Civil War, Confederate and Union troops sparred over the flag-and ultimately it flew over the Tennessee capitol building. In 1837, Driver moved to Nashville and flew his enormous flag every day on a line strung between his attic and a tree in his lawn. According to the myth, when he hoisted the flag, he declared: “My ship, my flag, Old Glory.” While that probably didn’t happen, it’s true Driver called the flag Old Glory in his memoirs in 1862.īut that wasn’t the end of the story of Old Glory. He flew the flag from the mast of his ship, the Charles Doggett. The flag was made for him as a gift by his mother and her sewing circle in Salem to celebrate his appointment to captain in 1824. Before it became a nickname for the flag of the United States, it was the name given to one specific American flag owned by William Driver, a sea captain from Salem, Massachusetts. The story of how the American flag became known as Old Glory is one that says a lot about the history of the United States as a nation. As its lyrics go: “The red and white and starry blue / is freedom’s shield and hope.” In 1896, John Philip Sousa composed a march he titled “The Stars and Stripes Forever”-and in 1987 it became the official National March of the US. Hence the nickname the Stars and Stripes, which dates back to at least 1809. Whether it was Ross or Hopkins, since the earliest days, those distinctive stars and stripes were part of what made the flag of the United States unique. But more likely, it was designed by Francis Hopkinson, a signer of the Declaration of Independence, based on an earlier naval design. Sorry, Betsy, but the story is unsubstantiated. The Flag Resolution of 1777 decreed that the Union Jack be replaced with 13 white stars on a blue field, one for each state (13 at the time, of course).Īs it’s popularly told, the original design for the American flag-with the stars displayed in a ring-was sewn by Betsy Ross based in part on a sketch by George Washington. The Grand Union Flag had 13 red and white stripes, but instead of stars in the upper right-hand corner, it showed the Union Jack (the flag of Great Britain). The original design of the American flag is based off the so-called Grand Union Flag, also known as the Continental Colors Flag.
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