Marc Leepson - Flag: An American Biography
Here you can read online Marc Leepson - Flag: An American Biography full text of the book (entire story) in english for free. Download pdf and epub, get meaning, cover and reviews about this ebook. year: 2006, publisher: St. Martin’s Griffin, genre: Politics. Description of the work, (preface) as well as reviews are available. Best literature library LitArk.com created for fans of good reading and offers a wide selection of genres:
Romance novel
Science fiction
Adventure
Detective
Science
History
Home and family
Prose
Art
Politics
Computer
Non-fiction
Religion
Business
Children
Humor
Choose a favorite category and find really read worthwhile books. Enjoy immersion in the world of imagination, feel the emotions of the characters or learn something new for yourself, make an fascinating discovery.
- Book:Flag: An American Biography
- Author:
- Publisher:St. Martin’s Griffin
- Genre:
- Year:2006
- Rating:4 / 5
- Favourites:Add to favourites
- Your mark:
Flag: An American Biography: summary, description and annotation
We offer to read an annotation, description, summary or preface (depends on what the author of the book "Flag: An American Biography" wrote himself). If you haven't found the necessary information about the book — write in the comments, we will try to find it.
The thirteen-stripe, fifty-star flag is as familiar an American icon as any that has existed in the nations history. Yet the history of the flag, especially its origins, is cloaked in myth and misinformation.Flag: An American Biographyrectifies that situation by presenting a lively,
comprehensive, illuminating look at the history of the American flag from its beginnings to today.
Journalist and historian Marc Leepson uncovers scores of little-known, fascinating facts as he traces the evolution of the American flag from the colonial period to the twenty-first century.Flagsifts through the historical evidence to---among many other things---uncover the truth behind the Betsy Ross myth and to discover the true designer of the Stars and Stripes. It details the many colorful and influential Americans who shaped the history of the flag.
Flag, as the novelist Nelson DeMille says in his preface, is not a book with an agenda or a subjective point of view. It is an objective history of the American flag, well researched, well presented, easy to read and understand, and very informative and entertaining.
Our love for the flag may be incomprehensible to others, but at least we now have a comprehensive guide to its unfolding.
---The Wall Street Journal
The fascination of history is in its details, and the author ofFlag: An American Biographyknows how to find them and turn them into compelling reading.... This book brings out the irony, humor, myth, and behind-the-scenes happenings that make our flags 228-year history so fascinating.
---The Saturday Evening Post
Timely and insightful.
---TheDallasMorning News
comprehensive, illuminating look at the history of the American flag from its beginnings to today.
Journalist and historian Marc Leepson uncovers scores of little-known, fascinating facts as he traces the evolution of the American flag from the colonial period to the twenty-first century.Flagsifts through the historical evidence to---among many other things---uncover the truth behind the Betsy Ross myth and to discover the true designer of the Stars and Stripes. It details the many colorful and influential Americans who shaped the history of the flag.
Flag, as the novelist Nelson DeMille says in his preface, is not a book with an agenda or a subjective point of view. It is an objective history of the American flag, well researched, well presented, easy to read and understand, and very informative and entertaining.
Our love for the flag may be incomprehensible to others, but at least we now have a comprehensive guide to its unfolding.
---The Wall Street Journal
The fascination of history is in its details, and the author ofFlag: An American Biographyknows how to find them and turn them into compelling reading.... This book brings out the irony, humor, myth, and behind-the-scenes happenings that make our flags 228-year history so fascinating.
---The Saturday Evening Post
Timely and insightful.
---TheDallasMorning News
Marc Leepson: author's other books
Who wrote Flag: An American Biography? Find out the surname, the name of the author of the book and a list of all author's works by series.
Marc Leepson
Robert Stone
Robert Justin Goldstein
Robert Justin Goldstein
Alison Eldridge
Carl Memling
Anne Cunningham
Michael Corcoran
Flag: An American Biography — read online for free the complete book (whole text) full work
Below is the text of the book, divided by pages. System saving the place of the last page read, allows you to conveniently read the book "Flag: An American Biography" online for free, without having to search again every time where you left off. Put a bookmark, and you can go to the page where you finished reading at any time.
Light
Font size:
↓
↑
Reset
Interval:
↓
↑
Bookmark:
Make
In memory of my grandparents:
Pauline Tarnovsky Leepson
Morris Leepson
Rose Friedenberg Levin
Herman Levin
Morris Leepson
Rose Friedenberg Levin
Herman Levin
Our flag carries American ideas, American history and American feelings. It is not a painted rag. It is a whole national history. It is the Constitution. It is the Government. It is the emblem of the sovereignty of the people. It is the NATION.
Henry Ward Beecher, 1861
Your flag decal wont get you into heaven anymore.
John Prine, 1969
Table of Contents
A BIOGRAPHY, according to most dictionaries, is an account of a persons life, written or told by another.
But here, Marc Leepson has expanded the meaning of the word and written a biography of an inanimate object: the American flag. And what a great job he has done.
Mr. Leepson begins at the beginning with the birth of the flag in 1777 during the American Revolution, and proceeds through the flags infancy during the War of 1812, its childhood during the Civil War, its adolescence during the Spanish-American War, and its coming-of-age during the world wars.
And then there was the Vietnam War, when the flag, always venerated until then, became a symbol of the divisiveness that split the nation. The chapters that deal with the Vietnam period, at home and overseas, are worth the price of the book.
On a personal note, I served in Vietnam and during my year there, I rarely saw an American flag displayed at military installations or in combat operations. In fact, my photographs taken in Vietnam verify that memory. Mr. Leepson in his book writes:
In Vietnam, some American troops flew the flag as their fathers did in Korea and in Europe and Japan during World War II and as theirgrandfathers did in the trenches in World War I. The flag flew over American bases, remote outposts, and landing zones. Some troops carried small flags into battle, especially during the wars early years before it became controversial at home.
The key words there are especially during the wars early years before it became controversial at home. By the time I got to Vietnam in November 1967, what was happening at home was starting to affect how newly arriving troops viewed the war, and thus conspicuous displays of patriotism, such as flying or carrying the American flag, were waning. This was in stark contrast to the Viet Cong and North Vietnamese troops as well as our South Vietnamese allies, who often carried flags into battle, and rallied around their flags, and also raised them in defiance of the enemy. I saw little of that on the American side during my tour of duty, and one might say that this period was the absolute low point of the American flag.
By the time of the first Gulf War, however, the flag had again become a unifying symbol, at least to most of the nation. And on September 11, 2001, the American flag flying over the ruins of the World Trade Center sprouted tens of thousands of new American flags across this country, Europe, and the world.
Many countries have more than one national symbol or emblem, some of which are religious, cultural, or pertain to royalty. In America, however, there are only two national symbolsthe bald eagle, not known by everyone in other nations, and the American flagknown to the entire world. Marc Leepson explores the close identification of America and Americans with their flag and their country. A quote from Henry Ward Beecher in 1861 on the eve of the Civil War sums up this feeling:
Our flag carries American ideas, American history and American feelings. It is not a painted rag. It is a whole national history. It is the Constitution. It is the Government. It is the emblem of sovereignty of the people. It is the NATION.
Mr. Leepson also discusses the cult of the flag, which swept the nation following the Civil War and led to the incorporation of the flag motif into many aspects of American life, art, home decoration, and public displaysa phenomenon that continues to this day and one that is rarely seen in other countries.
Flag: An American Biography is not a book with an agenda, or a subjective point of view; it is an objective history of the American flag, well researched, well presented, easy to read and understand, and very informative and entertaining.
One of the most entertaining aspects of Flag is its focus on personalities. For instance, Francis Hopkinson, a signer of the Declaration of Independence, is probably the designer of the American flagnot Betsy Ross. There are other such tidbits in the book, which keep us turning the pages, and probably causing us to read out loud to anyone nearby.
This is one of those books that seem as though someone should have written it years agobut better late than never. Flag: An American Biography is a must read for scholars, history buffs, patriotic organizations, flag wavers, flag burners, anyone who owns an American flag or has seen a flag in the last forty-eight hours.
This iconic symbol of the nation, which is so ubiquitous in our lives, needs a history, and this is the definitive history of the Flag of the United States of America. Marc Leepson has done a wonderful job of making this inanimate object come alive and speak to us.
Nelson DeMille
A MERICANS HAVE a unique and special feeling for our flag. And thats putting it mildly. This is not to diminish the respect and pride people in other nations feel for their national emblems. However, no country in the world can match the intensity of the American citizenrys attachment to the fifty-star, thirteen-stripe Stars and Stripes, which is as familiar an American icon as any that has existed in the nations history.
Nowhere on earth do citizens fly their national flags, as Americans do, everywhere they live and everywhere they go, from our front porches to our pickup trucks. The flag is a fixture in our nations schools, in our mass media, and in our advertising. The flag flies in front of our government buildings and business establishments of all types, including countless automobile dealer showrooms throughout the land that specialize in flying extra large Stars and Stripes.
Nor does any nation turn to its flag as an emotional, political, and patriotic symbol in good times and bad the way Americans do. We display the red-white-and-blue American flag at festive cultural and social events to celebrate and, at times of national tragedy, to grieve and show our resolve.
No nation displays its national flag as ubiquitously or as proudly as Americans do at sporting events, from local Little League fields to the Super Bowl.And no nation can match the widespread use of the American flag as a decorative part of countless items of apparel and accessories, from headbands to designer jewelry.
We Americans, alone among the nations of the world, have our schoolchildren pledge their allegiance to the flag, and we have done so for more than a century. Our National Anthem is a hymn of praise to our flag. Our largest veterans service organization, the American Legion, has had an Americanism division since it was founded in 1919. It promotes the display of, and dispenses advice about, the proper use of the American flag. The second largest veterans group, the Veterans of Foreign Wars, similarly promotes the flag through its own Americanism program.
The proper use of the flag itself is detailed in a one-of-a-kind document, the official U.S. Flag Code, a long, detailed set of rules that was developed at the instigation of the newly formed American Legion in the early 1920s. The code has been a federal statute since 1942.
Light
Font size:
↓
↑
Reset
Interval:
↓
↑
Bookmark:
Make
Similar books «Flag: An American Biography»
Look at similar books to Flag: An American Biography. We have selected literature similar in name and meaning in the hope of providing readers with more options to find new, interesting, not yet read works.
Robert Stone
Robert Justin Goldstein
Robert Justin Goldstein
Alison Eldridge
Carl Memling
Anne Cunningham
Michael Corcoran
Reviews about «Flag: An American Biography»
Discussion, reviews of the book Flag: An American Biography and just readers' own opinions. Leave your comments, write what you think about the work, its meaning or the main characters. Specify what exactly you liked and what you didn't like, and why you think so.