My Favorite Flag: The True Centennial Banner
From a Civil War veteran’s daughter to a young picker in 1960s New York, a rare 37-star banner carries a very personal meaning into America’s 250th year.
Semiquincentennial. Try saying it three times fast—I can’t, so I’ll stick with “250th anniversary.” As we celebrate our semi… (well, you know the word), we recall that one of the most enduring symbols of our nation is our flag, that beautiful, bold, red, white, and blue banner that flies from countless flagpoles across the country.
My earliest memory of our nation’s flag dates back to the mid-1960s, when I was about ten. By then, I had already been dealing in antiques for nearly four years. I regularly trawled our New York City neighborhood with my red wagon, hunting for discarded treasures on the curbs of Brooklyn, Queens, and Manhattan. On weekends, I sold my finds at the 26th Street Flea Market.
One Friday afternoon, I hurried home from school, eager to trade my uniform for what we called “play clothes” and meet my friends for a bicycle ride. As I approached my friend’s house on 112th Avenue, I noticed something that made my heart race: a pile of “trash” about as tall as I was. My friends told me the “old people” were moving. I quickly abandoned thoughts of a bike ride and recruited my gang to help me salvage this trove. Once we had the pile safely stashed at my friend’s house, I ran home for my red wagon and began ferrying the cache to my house.
During one of these trips, the “old lady” came out and motioned for me to come to her. She asked why I was taking the items from her curb. I told her I took them because they were beautiful and I liked them. She asked my name, told me she was Marie, and said she was glad I was taking the things because she thought they were beautiful, too. She explained that she and her husband were “almost ninety years old,” moving to a smaller place, and had no children; she simply couldn’t take everything with her.
She asked me to sit on her stoop and went back inside. When she returned, she carried a small bundle. “This was my father’s,” she said. “He was a soldier in the Civil War.” I slowly unrolled the towel to reveal a flag and a section of flagstaff with a brass terminal. The flag—a silk 37-star Centennial-era flag—caught the breeze as it unfurled, and I was instantly captivated by its diaphanous beauty.
Attached to the staff and brass end cap was a label that read: “1905, Cut off end of 5th Minn. Inft. Battle flag staff, to [sic] long for case at new capitol. See newspaper account of transfer of flags from old to new capitol 1905.”
The 5th Minnesota Infantry was a Union volunteer regiment that served in the Western Theater, seeing significant action at Corinth, Vicksburg, and Nashville, and in the Red River and Mobile campaigns, while elements were also engaged in the U.S-Dakota War on the Minnesota frontier.
Marie explained that this fragment was removed from one of the original staffs of Minnesota’s Civil War battle flags when the state ceremonially transferred those flags from the old Capitol to the new Minnesota State Capitol in St. Paul on Flag Day, June 14, 1905. The staff lengths proved too long for the new display cases in the Capitol Rotunda and were cut down. Portions of some of the brass endcaps were melted to create small presentation souvenirs for officials and other honored guests. This particular end segment, retaining its brass terminal and handwritten label, was preserved as a personal memento.
By this time, Marie was crying. She told me that because I appreciated “the old things,” she wanted me to have these pieces. Watching the tears spill down her cheeks, I refused; I couldn’t imagine taking such precious items from her. Then she explained that if I didn’t accept them, they would probably end up in the trash after she died. She asked me to keep them and treasure them—and I have.
The stars of the 37-star flag are arranged in a distinctive 6-6-6-7-6-6 configuration, displayed in a tumbling orientation. This star count reflects Nebraska’s admission to the Union on March 1, 1867; the flag officially took effect on July 4 of that year. The 37-star flag was in use during portions of both the Reconstruction era and the Indian Wars, and Presidents Andrew Johnson, Ulysses S. Grant, and Rutherford B. Hayes all served under this configuration.
Although the 37-star flag remained official through July 3, 1877, and was the designated national flag during the Centennial year of 1876, surviving examples are comparatively scarce. Anticipating Colorado’s admission on August 1, 1876, flag makers judged the 37-star design obsolete and instead produced 38-star flags in great quantity for Centennial celebrations. As a result, true 37-star “Centennial flags” are surprisingly uncommon.
That evening, when my father, a Marine veteran, came home from work, I showed him the flag. After thoughtfully examining it, he taught me how to fold it—a lesson I have never forgotten. The next morning, I raced to Marie’s house to show her how I had folded her father’s cherished flag. With tears in his eyes, her husband told me that Marie had passed during the night. He said the move from her home had broken her heart. By the time I walked back home, I, too, was crying. To this day, I still get a lump in my throat when I remember that moment.
So, this piece of colored silk means far more to me than a symbol of our nation. It was a gift from the heart, albeit a broken one. It remains a tangible link to a woman who loved her flag, and to my father, who taught me how to honor and care for it. Happy Semiquincentennial, America!
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