Perhaps as a testimony to the rank power such symbolism holds, witness the furor in England that at first the flag was not at half-staff over Buckingham Palace when Lady Di died.
And it’s a particular meaningful part of British policy, as far as I could tell, that the whole point is that that flag, over the symbol of the Government/British nation as a whole, never is lowered: The King is Dead, Long Live the King–the flag never drops.
But apparently many people in England didn’t get the memo, or, by 1997 they had become internationalized (if half-staff is more than USA) enough that nothing less was accepted. So against years of tradition (if not English law somewhere), the flag was flown at half staff.
Just as the remarkable emotion (remarkable for Brits) was seen as novel with that event, apparently it was demanded that the Queen Herself express it, which she and her ministers wouldn’t do until it became too big a political issue.
Back in the 80s my brother worked as an armed security guard at a Presidential library (i.e. it was under federal jurisdiction). He worked the night shift so it was also his job to hoist the flag up each morning. The day after the shuttle Challenger disaster he received an official memo stating that the flag was to be put at half-staff that morning.
Some are nylon, some polyester. I just replaced a faded polyester flag with a new nylon flag, and burned the old one.
I will never do that again. It released large clouds of noxious black smoke and left a pile of messy plastic ash that I haven’t yet cleaned out of my metal firepit.
As far as I’m concerned, from now on, old flags made out of synthetic materials go in the trash.