Is Texas the only state flying 6 flags?

Or would some of the connected states, like the Oklahoma panhandle or the Florida panhandle also qualify?

And I almost forgot:

How many flags for the whole US? There would be Russia too, right? and Dutch. And Canada? or was that still Britain when the borders moved?

Oh crap, where’s that T. R. Ferenbach when I need him…
(T. R. Ferenbach wrote Lone Star, the best chance we’ve got for reconciling the Story of Texas with the stuff the historians mess with…)

First off, T, I want to thank you for giving me a chance to fly the flag and throw the bullshit! I’ll try to keep this as factual as I can.

Ok, the six flags of Texas are:

[list=1]
[li]Spain. The original manifest destiny of North America. Stalled out in Texas due to Commanche, a lack of silver up there and miles and miles of Texas (Aussies and Alaskans: oh, shaddup, we’re big too!)[/li][li]France. Various settlements; France’s claim to lands drained by the Missippi and Napoleon’s control of Spain.[/li][li]Mexico. The folks we jilted.[/li][li]The Republic of Texas/Texas. Malcolm McLaren is a yankee. He just thinks he’s Texas.[/li][li]The US. The folks we haven’t jilted yet.[/li][li]The Confederacy. No comment.[/li][/list=1]

Now, as you stated, Texas originally included parts of New Mexico, Oklahoma, Colorado (I’m not sure how you added Florida to the list), and a few other states (can’t find a map, can’t find Ferenbach’s book.) Back then, you had to travel back into Mexico to get to Santa Fe, but it didn’t matter; Texas claimed it and a whole lot more. After annexation, the new State of Texas sold these lands to the US, then went broke, denied the original sale and sold them to the US again. Since none of these other states were part of the Confederacy but were claimed by Mexico and the European powers that ruled her, they could claim the other five flags and add their own state flag, but for some reason, these states seem to downplay the fact that they were once part of Texas; I don’t know why.

I could probably think of some other states that had six different flags flying over them at one time or another, but my eyes are hurting from looking at this monitor and I’ve gotta get up in the morning.

You know, I was also going to point out that there’s a lot more than six flags flying over Texas. It’s not the Seventies anymore, and Willie’s fallen out of fashion, but we’ve still got hundereds at least of that Lone Star on stuff all over the place!

I once counted 6 flags over California. Let’s see if I can get this right.

  1. Britain (Sir Francis Drake and all that - it was so short-lived, I don’t know if this really counts, but he did claim the land for Britain)
  2. Spain
  3. Russia (small portion of Northern California)
  4. Mexico
  5. California Republic (we still have the flag)
  6. United States

Ta da.

Georgia claims six but I think they cheat. Let’s see…
Spain
Britain
France (when? La Salle was here?)
Portugal (I wanna see some documentation!)
Confederate (still flying as part of the state flag)
USA

Is the “6” an important number or are we just looking at states flying many different flags?

6 is a random number…we’re using it because of the Six Flags amusement parks, which I believe originated in Texas, because Texas has had 6 flags fly over it.

Beyond those already mentioned:

Sweden: There were Swedish colonies early on, in parts of what eventually became New Jersey, Pennsylvania, and Deleware. Wilmingoton, Delaware, was founded as Fort Christina by the New Sweden Company in 1638. I’m not sure what the relationship was between the company and the Swedish government. New Sweden was conquered by the Dutch in 1655.

Hawaii was an independent monarchy.

Vermont was essentially independent between the Revolutionary War and its admission to the Union in 1791.

The State of Franklin was more-or-less independent from 1784 to 1788. It broke off from North Carolina after that state ceded its western territories but before the federal government accepted them. The territory in question eventually became part of eastern Tennessee.

My uncle tells the story that Pittsburg, in northernmost New Hampshire, was once independent because neither New Hampshire nor Quebec wanted it. I’m not sure I believe that one.

By the way, a noted columnist once wrote:
http://www.straightdope.com/classics/a5_235.html

Do territories/commonwealths count? If so, you can add Denmark, from whom we bought the U.S. Virgin Islands (if memory serves). Did we take Samoa from Germany after WWI?

The Japanese took an Aleutian or two during WWII. You can count that to boost the total…

I thought they had some made up during the French and Indian wars.

They did adopt a lot of European customs and clothing during that era.