Flag Day

Flag Day, anniversary of the adoption of the American flag in 1777. It is celebrated on June 14 but is not a legal holiday.

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(jargon)

flag day - A software change that is neither forward- nor backward-compatible, and which is costly to make and costly to reverse. E.g. "Can we install that without causing a flag day for all users?" This term has nothing to do with the use of the word flag to mean a variable that has two values. It came into use when a massive change was made to the Multics time-sharing system to convert from the old ASCII code to the new one; this was scheduled for Flag Day (a US holiday), June 14, 1966. See also backward combatability, lock-in.

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Flag Day

June 14

On June 14, 1777, the Continental Congress replaced the British symbols of George Washington's Grand Union flag with a new design featuring 13 white stars in a circle on a field of blue and 13 red and white stripes—one for each state. Although it is not certain, this flag may have been made by the Philadelphia seamstress Betsy Ross who was an official flagmaker for the Pennsylvania Navy. The number of stars increased as the new states entered the Union, but the number of stripes stopped at 15 and was later returned to 13.
President Woodrow Wilson issued a proclamation that established June 14 as Flag Day in 1916, but it didn't become official until 1949. This occurred as a result of a campaign by Bernard J. Cigrand and the American Flag Day Association.
It is observed across the country by displaying the American flag on homes and public buildings. Other popular ways of observing this day include flag-raising ceremonies, the singing of the national anthem, and the study of flag etiquette and the flag's origin and meaning. Each year more than 3,000 schoolchildren form a living American flag at Fort McHenry National Monument in Baltimore, Md., near where Francis Scott Key wrote "The Star-Spangled Banner" ( see also Defenders' Day).

CONTACTS:
National Flag Day Foundation
418 S. Broadway
P.O. Box 435
Baltimore, MD 21231
410-563-3524
www.flagday.org
Fort McHenry National Monument and Historic Shrine
National Park Service
End of S. Fort Ave.
Baltimore, MD 21230
410-962-4290; fax: 410-962-2500
www.nps.gov/fomc

SOURCES:
AmerBkDays-2000, p. 444
AnnivHol-2000, p. 100
BkHolWrld-1986, Jun 14
DictDays-1988, p. 42
HolSymbols-2009, p. 264
PatHols-2006, p. 117

Celebration day: Jun 14

Celebrated in: Argentina, Liberia, Panama