TWeeD ([info]densaer) wrote,
@ 2008-04-25 07:06:00
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Flags of the founders.


The HBO series "John Adams" has been running, and I've recorded all the episodes, and watched about half of them. One of the things I've come to find inspiring are the opening credits, in which a number of famous Revolutionary War flags are displayed.



I have become curious as to what the flags were used for, and who made them. It turns out that the "Join or Die" motto was created by Benjamin Franklin (the man did everything, didn't he?) The striped flag with the rattlesnake may be historically inaccurate - It's called the "First Navy Jack" and is currently the Jack flown by all US Navy warships since 2002 and during the duration of the War on Terrorism.



So yes, a montage on television had gotten me interested in all sorts of early American flags. Everyone needs a hobby, I guess, but I've found through the variation and types of flags, you can piece together some of the drama of those times.

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[info]banacheq
2008-04-25 03:39 pm UTC (link)
Benjamin Franklin (the man did everything, didn't he?)

Yes. Yes he did. He's my only personal hero. Did tworesearch essays on him back in High School.

BTW, if you don't mind muscials, go rent "1776".


The "Don't Tread On Me" stirs something in my memory from growing up in SC. Might be the state motto or something, BUT here's the origin:
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Gadsden_flag

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[info]densaer
2008-04-25 03:55 pm UTC (link)
I dunno - that music in the YouTube clip is pretty stirring to me. I brought it this morning from iTunes.

Franklin made 48 edits to the draft of the Declaration (including changing "Life, Liberty and Property" to "Life, Liberty and the Pursuit of Happiness")

The Declaration and the founding of the country was as good as humanly possible, I think, given the conditions and the times of the Founders, even though critics at the time called out some of the fundamental issues about liberty (vis slavery):

We hold (they say) these truths to be self-evident: That all men are created equal. In what are they created equal? Is it in size, understanding, figure, moral or civil accomplishments, or situation of life? Every plough-man knows that they are not created equal in any of these....That every man hath an unalienable right to liberty; and here the words, as it happens, are not nonsense, but they are not true: slaves there are in America, and where there are slaves, there liberty is alienated. If the Creator hath endowed man with an unalienable right to liberty, no reason in the world will justify the abridgement of that liberty, and a man hath a right to do everything that he thinks proper without controul or restraint; and upon the same principle, there can be no such things as servants, subjects, or government of any kind whatsoever. In a word, every law that hath been in the world since the formation of Adam, gives the lie to this self-evident truth, (as they are pleased to term it) ; because every law, divine or human, that is or hath been in the world, is an abridgement of man's liberty. (The Gentleman's Magazine, vol. 46, pp. 403–404)

The Gentleman's Magazine in England was the first place where the Declaration was published outside of the United States, in August 1776, so you can see how the issue of slavery, the thorn that would be in the country until the Civil War and whose ramifications are with us today, was appreciated and criticized.

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[info]densaer
2008-04-25 04:28 pm UTC (link)
And the Gadsden flag had its ultimate origin in the Benjamin Franklin woodcarving ... the rattlesnake symbol was common at that time. See, it all comes back to Ben.

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