[coasterville]

Let me try this again, here is my 15 "dancing" stars Star Spangled Banner. Too bad the wind didn't want to play along


In case you can't really see the flag in it's natural habitat, here it is laid flat:

It was made by Annin and is from their Bulldog line.

(I was wanting to go retro, but you see the occasional Betsy Ross and Bennington, so I went with something that may cause people to pause and look. I wonder what people think when they see these unusual variants being flown by flag and history enthusiasts)

[Robin Hickman]

.

ATTA BOY, COASTERVILLE !!!







Robin
.

[Peter Ansoff]

Thanks for the pix, Coasterville and Robin -- great stuff! It's really good to see an authentic "Star Spangled Banner."

My display on the 14th was a "history of the flag" sequence on my 3 poles: the pre-1800 British red ensign, the Continental Colors, and the 13-star Fowle Flag. Unfortunately, the weather here was an "Irish Hurricane" -- rain and no wind.

Peter Ansoff

[coasterville]

I wouldn't call mine authentic, I would say replica...

It's actually less than a year old, bought it last fall from a flag dealer online. It's an Annin flag made from Bulldog cotton. I do like that the stars "dance" as opposed to the cheaper flags where they are all in nice neat straight rows like the modern day flag. Though looking at the miniflag in my office, it has the straight even stars and it came from Annin as well.

It's neat that the "stars" on the cotton flag look like they were cut from leather or some similar type material and were then sewn to the flag, instead of the embroidery process you commonly see.

I ordered it with some other stuff I needed from the flag dealer and I recall havng to wait a couple weeks as I was told it was a "Special Order Item" The probably means the dealer doesn't keep them in stock even through it was in the catalog. I wouldn't think Annin makes them to order. I did notice it does NOT have the Flag Makers of America (or whatever its called) seal on their imprint. But then I don't know if they put than on all flags or only the 50 star ones.

I'll rotate through this one, my Betsy Ross and my Bennington as we lead into the Fourth of July. Hmm, maybe need to acquire a Grand Union just to add to the set.

[NAVA1974]

"I wouldn't call mine authentic, I would say replica..."

Per Wikipedia:
"In historical reenactment, authenticity (sometimes referred to as the A-factor or simply A) is a measure of how close an item, prop, action, weapon, or custom is, to what would actually have been used or done in the time period being depicted."

I believe Peter was referring to the fact that the star arrangement in your reproduction faithfully reproduced the star pattern in the original SSB. Until recently (per Flag Guys in NY??) there were no SSB reproductions that tried to accurately copy the star pattern that Ms. Pickersgill produced.

Nick

[Peter Ansoff]

I wouldn't call mine authentic, I would say replica...

You're right, of course. I just meant that it was good to see one with the authentic star pattern. I don't think that any of us would want a completely authentic replica of the SSB. I know I couldn't afford a big enough flag pole!

Peter A.

[coasterville]

Thanks for the explanation - I was thinking of authentic in terms of the collecting community, not the historic re-enactment community.

Yeah, if one really did have a genuine from the 1800's Star Spangled Banner, it probably would not look to be in that good of condition, let alone somebody just casually flying a historical airloom of that signifigance.

[csaanv]

This is interesting. I believe the "dancing" star arrangement by Annin is a recent occurrence. In fact just since it took over Dettras a few years back. Here is my evidence, a about 10 years I bought a sewn cotton Annin SSB but the stars were all straight up and down, pointing up. A year after that I bought Dettras version of the SSB which had the "dancing" star arrangement which is the reason I bought it. This leads me to believe that Annin adopted Dettras version since the takeover. I have also seen this happen to the North Carolina flag which Annin adopted Dettras version of the flag which was a small detail of the size of the letters, N and C. If I get time this weekend I will post photos as evidence.

[bhandarigroup]

Thanks Nick for providing the history of the flag day. It's a good sharing among all. I wish all the "Happy Flag Day".

[coasterville]

Intersting that Annin changed their design. I suppose when they merged product lines, they saw that the Dettra version was more accurate and kept that one.

Last week one of my neighbors was walking by and did stop to ask about the Star Spangled Banner. Any chance to talk about your collection is a welcome break in the day, right?