Recitation, "The Name of Old Glory" (by James Whitcomb Riley)
Song, "The Unfurling of the Flag" (by Clara Endicott Sears)
"Why we should love the Flag" (Best original speech by grade pupil)
Recitation, "Old Flag" (by Hubbard Parker)
Song, "We'll Keep Old Glory Flying" (by Carleton S. Montanye)
Flag drill and grand march, All pupils of grades 5, 6, 7, 8
Presentation of new flag by father of pupil
Flag Salute: "I pledge allegiance to my flag and to the Republic for which it stands; one Nation, indivisible, with Liberty and Justice for all"
On the 2d of July, 1776, the American Congress resolved "that these united colonies are, and of right ought to be, free and independent states; and that all political connection between us and the states of Great Britain is, and ought to be, totally dissolved." On the 4th of July a Declaration of Independence was adopted by the Congress, and sent out under its authority, to announce to all other nations that the United States of America claimed a place among them. On this 4th of July the nation was born. Its flag, the visible symbol of its power, was not adopted till 1777.
On the 14th of June, 1777, Congress resolved "that the flag of the thirteen United States be thirteen stripes, alternate red and white; that the union be thirteen stars, white in a blue field, representing a new constellation."
The national flag--_our_ national flag--grew in the most direct way out of the banners that had waved over the colonists. The flag of the United Colonies had thirteen stripes, one for each colony, and the stripes were alternate red and white. This part of the old flag remained unchanged in the new one. Each colony retained its stripe.
The flag of the colonies, in its union, had displayed the king's colors. There was now no longer a king in America, but a new Union had arisen--a Union of Thirteen States--no longer a Union of kingdoms. The union of the old flag had been the crosses of St. George and St. Andrew conjoined on a blue field. The new union was a circle of silver stars in a blue sky--"a new constellation."
The flag of the United States was derived from the flag of the United Colonies in the simplest and most natural manner. The old flag had expressed the hopes and aspirations of thirteen colonies which had united in order to secure justice from their king and fellow-countrymen in England. The new flag expressed the determined resolve of the same thirteen colonies--now become sovereign states--to form a permanent Union, and to take their place among the nations of the world. They were no longer Englishmen; they were Americans.