Dear Editors:
Thank you for setting the record straight on Betsy Ross' contribution to the Revolutionary War. The following is FYI: (1) Continental Congressman Francis Hopkinson of New Jersey designed a flag for the United States and a flag for the U.S. Navy. Ironically, the latter flag became the prototype for the National flag. (2) Prior to Hopkinson's designs, the unofficial U.S. flag had 13 red-and-white stripes with the British Union Jack in the upper-left-hand corner (canton). It was called the Continental Colors, aka, the Grand Union Flag. (3) Red, white, and blue are traditional British colors. The U.S. Flag Resolution of June 14, 1777, did not indicate what the colors mean. The presumed meaning of red, white, and blue in the American flag really applies to the Great Seal of the United States. (4) The arrangement of 13 stars in a ring in early U.S. flags did not symbolize the equality of states vis-a-vis each other. Instead, it denoted the perpetuity and eternity of America, according to Charles Thomson, the consultant to the third Great Seal of the United States Committee. A ring denotes eternity. Earl P. Williams, Jr., U.S. flag historian (paleovexillologist)
Dear Editors:
Thank you for setting the record straight on Betsy Ross' contribution to the Revolutionary War. The following is FYI: (1) Continental Congressman Francis Hopkinson of New Jersey designed a flag for the United States and a flag for the U.S. Navy. Ironically, the latter flag became the prototype for the National flag. (2) Prior to Hopkinson's designs, the unofficial U.S. flag had 13 red-and-white stripes with the British Union Jack in the upper-left-hand corner (canton). It was called the Continental Colors, aka, the Grand Union Flag. (3) Red, white, and blue are traditional British colors. The U.S. Flag Resolution of June 14, 1777, did not indicate what the colors mean. The presumed meaning of red, white, and blue in the American flag really applies to the Great Seal of the United States. (4) The arrangement of 13 stars in a ring in early U.S. flags did not symbolize the equality of states vis-a-vis each other. Instead, it denoted the perpetuity and eternity of America, according to Charles Thomson, the consultant to the third Great Seal of the United States Committee. A ring denotes eternity. Earl P. Williams, Jr., U.S. flag historian (paleovexillologist)