FLAGS AND STATE(S) OF THE UNION

THE INTERESTING FACTS WEBSITE aroused my curiosity about our states’ flags. Here are tidbits about a couple of them.

Oregon. In particular, Oregon’s is the only state flag with different designs front and back. 

Image by Denelson83 from Wikipedia.

Above, the front celebrates Oregon’s 1859 statehood with an official seal featuring oxen and a covered wagon traveling the Oregon Trail. Around it are agricultural implements, a deer and towering trees, sailing ships, and the sun setting into the Pacific. As with many other states, the flag design includes stars (here, 33 of them representing Oregon being the 33rd state admitted to the Union) and a benevolent eagle. 

The Oregon flag’s other side. Image by Zscout 370 from English Wikipedia.

On the other side is a golden beaver, celebrating this animal’s importance in the early fur trade. Only relatively recently have we come to respect environmental benefits of its dam-building domiciles.

Alaska. The Alaska.Edu website describes, “In the first months of 1926, Territorial Gov. George Parks was working hard for the cause of statehood. During a trip to Washington, D.C., he saw the flags of the 48 states flying outside the old Post Office Building and after conversing with the postmaster general he was convinced that Alaska also needed a flag to fly alongside the others. He persuaded the Alaska American Legion to hold a contest open to all Alaskan children grades 7-12 to design a flag for the state.”

Alaska’s flag portrays the Big Dipper and an Alaskan Forget-me-not flower in a dark blue sky. The Alaskan Forget-me-not serves dually as the North Star (Polaris).

“The contest winner,” the website says, “was Benny Benson, a seventh-grader at the territorial school at Seward. The flag was flown for the first time on July 9, 1927.  During this ceremony in Seward, Benny was awarded a watch with the flag emblem on it and a $1,000 educational scholarship.”

The North Star and the Oregon Trail. There’s a link between the flags of Oregon and Alaska, one residing in “A Day in the Life of a Person on the Oregon Trail,” HistoryFacts.com: “At night, the tongue of the lead wagon (the wooden arm that extends from the front of the wagon) was often pointed toward the North Star in order to orient the wagon train in the morning.”

Today, NASA describes veracity of this technique: “The North Star isn’t the brightest star in the sky, but it’s usually not hard to spot, even from the city. If you’re in the Northern Hemisphere, it can help you orient yourself and find your way, as it’s located in the direction of true north (or geographic north, as opposed to magnetic north).”

“Locating Polaris is easy on any clear night,” says NASA. “Just find the Big Dipper. The two stars on the end of the Dipper’s ‘cup’ point the way to Polaris, which is the tip of the handle of the Little Dipper, or the tail of the little bear in the constellation Ursa Minor.” 

Image from NASA/JPL-Caltech.

Note the NASA orientation contrasted to that of the Alaska flag. 

Upside-down SCOTUS. Let’s not enter into discussion of upside-down flags, other than noting the absurdity of Samuel Alito, his wife, or whomever displayed this judicial politicizing. For more on this, see “The Politicization of SCOTUS Threatens Its Legitimacy,” by James F. McHugh and Lauren Stiller Rikleen, Bloomsberg Law, June 30, 2022; and “The Growing Politicization of the US Supreme Court,” by Freyja Quinn, Eagleton Political Review, Rutgers University, April 16, 2024. ds

© Dennis Simanaitis, SimanaitisSays.com, 2024