Thank God for the brave men and women who took a huge chance on this noble experiment!
"Off with your hat, as the flag goes by!
And let the heart have its say;
You're man enough for a tear in your eye
That you will not wipe away." ~Henry Cuyler Bunner
This flag, which we honor and under which we serve, is the emblem of our unity, our power, our thought and purpose as a nation. It has no other character than that which we give it from generation to generation. The choices are ours. It floats in majestic silence above the hosts that execute those choices, whether in peace or in war. And yet, though silent, it speaks to us — speaks to us of the past, or the men and women who went before us, and of the records they wrote upon it. - Woodrow Wilson, 1917
A moth-eaten rag on a worm-eaten pole
It does not look likely to stir a man's soul,
'Tis the deeds that were done 'neath the moth-eaten rag,
When the pole was a staff, and the rag was a flag. ~Sir Edward B. Hamley, 1824-1893