No kidding. I’d guess back in the 50s, many more people still believed the Betsy Ross story so this didn’t seem so far fetched.
Me too. I wonder how much false information was spread from Reader’s Digest and Paul Harvey. Their popularity was pretty huge for a couple of decades.
So you could have named him without reading the article? That’s impressive.
Cecil has us covered up to 53 stars. So if we do D.C. and Puerto Rico, then we’ll have to grab something else. Climate change tells us we have to move north. Either we dust off Trump’s plan to buy Greenland, or it’s look out Canada, here we come!
My extensive knowledge of numerology has enabled me to design the following 54-star flag:
I ask only for a modest percentage. Extra star flags available upon special request.
Or add two at once: 52 is easy, if you’re willing to go with only eight rows of stars. Otherwise, not so much. Maybe go with a (death-)spiral, easy to add at random…
Oops, missed Cecil’s post. Still, six rows is a pretty big change!
It was earlier this year. I’m afraid I don’t remember the source, but it was probably not a particularly authoritative one, it was some website I googled.
I had heard the story before. The Eisenhower White House got a lot of suggested designs from the public for the upcoming 50-star flag, and several of them came very close to what was eventually adopted. Most of them, though (and I’ve seen copies from the Eisenhower Library), were amateurish, laughable, bizarre and/or fugly.
I too had heard the story before and I’m not even American. I suspect I read the Snopes article.
I do remember thinking that the story cannot have been as simple as was being suggested. The design adopted was one of the more obvious options, so I assumed that quite a few people were likely to have independently suggested it. Also, the important step in the process wouldn’t have been coming up with those obvious options, but the decision about which one to use.
Okay, thanks. I’m not sure if I should be embarrassed or not that a Canadian knows more fake US flag stories than I do.
The one that @Skywatcher posted above is a bit like that, especially the signature. I can’t figure if it’s signed by a doctor or a kid from Maryland because the printing is pretty childish.
The snopes article actually uses the Slate article from the OP in it’s debunking of the Haft story. I couldn’t find anything there earlier. Did they use to have a different article? It’s been such a long time since I looked at snopes that I didn’t even think to look there.
Speaking of redesigning the flag, if Macy Gray’s version is in the running I’m going to have to vote no. Looks like someone randomly spilled ice cream sprinkles all over. Not to mention squishing in the two extra stars.
But the Slate article itself cites the Snopes article, which is dated 22 June 2021. Looks like Snopes updated their article in the light of the Slate one, clunkingly adding a few new paragraphs at the end with the new research.
A related question: In early 1959 when Alaska became a state, did Americans already widely know Hawaii was going to become a state that year too, or did it take the average person by surprise?
I was only nine then so I might be misremembering but one of the reasons I asked whether the 49-star flag was produced much was because it was known to be only a short period before the 50th state was admitted.
The link in kenobi’s reply mentioned people buying them as a collectible back then, intending on selling them at a high price later. This is apparently still true as some nerf is attempting to sell his “vintage” 3x5 flag on eBay for $250 while the going rate for new ones range from $16 to $150. Another one-foot long hand flag is up for $90.
Wow, I’m surprised how many are on eBay. I wonder how they can prove it’s vintage. A new flag would probably be pretty easy to “age”. I think you’d need to be pretty knowledgeable about flags to spot a real one.
Yes, it was widely known, and only a relatively limited number of 49-star flags were produced, because it was expected that most people would just wait to get a 50-star flag when the time came.
I vaguely remember hearing of this story, but it’s not anything I would have remembered without direct prompting. I’m glad at least one such myth isn’t carrying through.
FWIW: Alaska officially entered the Union on January 3, 1959. Hawaii on August 21, 1959.
Both states were considered for admission together for the classic US reason: racism. Southerners wanted to get Alaska admitted at the same time as Hawaii in order to “balance” things out politically.
