You’ve probably seen U.S. flags popping up everywhere this week in advance of Independence Day. The Second Continental Congress adopted Betsy Ross’s creation as the official American flag on June 14, 1777. But did you know that Pittsburgh has a long and proud connection with Old Glory?
🇺🇸 Origins of a Holiday
While still in school, Collier Township native William Kerr founded the American Flag Day Association. In 1927, he organized more than 180,000 children to donate a penny each to build a monument at the bottom of Flagstaff Hill in Schenley Park. It was dedicated on June 14, 1927 — the 150th anniversary of the flag’s adoption.
Kerr ultimately lobbied Congress and the White House for more than 50 years to establish an official Flag Day holiday, and his persistence paid off in 1949 when Congress approved, and President Harry Truman signed into law, a national observance of Flag Day, with Kerr at his side. But the law did not establish Flag Day as a federal day off; Pennsylvania is the only state that celebrates it as a holiday.
🇺🇸 Flag Plaza in Pittsburgh
Pittsburgh’s ties to the American flag deepened further in 1968 with the creation of the National Flag Foundation to work with students and citizens to encourage respect for the flag and its ideals. That same year, Vivian Lehman, in honor of her late husband Chester H. Lehman, established a fund to build a memorial and headquarters for the now-Laurel Highlands Council of the Boy Scouts of America. Attached to 80-foot-tall poles, five flags now wave over Downtown Pittsburgh.
🇺🇸 How to Honorably Retire
If your flag is too tattered to fly, did you know you can dispose of them honorably? Cranberry resident Denise Etter founded Retire Your Unserviceable Old Glory in 2011. Since then, the project has collected and retired 46,000 flags in ceremonies with scouting troops, the VFW, the American Legion, and other organizations. Contact her here.
