On Sept. 14, 1814, U.S. soldiers at Baltimore’s Fort McHenry raised a huge American flag to celebrate a crucial victory over British forces during the War of 1812. The sight of those “broad stripes and bright stars” inspired Francis Scott Key to write a song that officially became the United States national anthem ON THIS DAY IN 1931. Key’s words gave new significance to a national symbol and started a tradition through which generations of Americans have invested the flag with their own meanings and memories.
"He said, I don't like to brag, but we're kinda proud of that ragged old flag....you see, we got a little hole in that flag there when Washington took it across the Delaware, and it got powder-burned the night Francis Scott Key sat watching it, writing say can you see."
(Taken from the National Museum of American History and Johnny Cash's Ragged Old Flag.)
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