You see it everywhere: on bumper stickers, tee shirts, lapel pins, in shop windows, and in front of nearly every school or government building. Yet while the American flag is ubiquitous, as a symbol it is both heavily freighted and misunderstood.Now an acclaimed European professor of American history brings a fresh perspective to the American flag, exploring its political, social, and cultural significance across the broad swath of its history. Mining a rich vein of materials from history, literature, music, and popular culture, Arnaldo Testi analyzes the symbolic importance of the flag to the national consciousness of this “nation of immigrants” and sees in it the very contradictions that make up our history: secularism and sacredness, freedom and empire, inclusiveness and aggressive self-confidence.Using sources as diverse as Walt Whitman and Jimi Hendrix, and events as divergent as the American Revolution, the moon landing, and the terrorist attacks of September 11th, Testi reveals the central importance of the flag to the creation of our nation, the evolution of our national character, and the spread of American culture and power across the globe, while illustrating the varied and often conflicting meanings different Americans ascribe to it.Whether you worship the flag or revile it, respect it or ignore it,Capture the Flagoffers the reader a colorful and compelling exploration of the sway it holds on the American imagination.

A richly woven biography of the beloved patriot Betsy Ross, and an enthralling portrait of everyday life in Revolutionary War-era PhiladelphiaBetsy Ross and the Making of Americais the first comprehensively researched and elegantly written biography of one of America's most captivating figures of the Revolutionary War. Drawing on new sources and bringing a fresh, keen eye to the fabled creation of "the first flag," Marla R. Miller thoroughly reconstructs the life behind the legend. This authoritative work provides a close look at the famous seamstress while shedding new light on the lives of the artisan families who peopled the young nation and crafted its tools, ships, and homes.Betsy Ross occupies a sacred place in the American consciousness, and Miller's winning narrative finally does her justice. This history of the ordinary craftspeople of the Revolutionary War and their most famous representative will be the definitive volume for years to come.

1. "Printed by authority of Senate Concurrent Resolution 108, 109th Congress."
   
2. Shipping list no.: 2008-0145-P.
   
3. Also available via Internet from GPO Access web site. Address as of 3/5/08: http://www.gpoaccess.gov/serialset/cdocuments/sd109-18/sd109-18.pdf; current access available via PURL.
   
4. Includes bibliographical references (p. 47-48).
   

Showcasing the largest personal collection of American flags, father and son team Peter and Kevin Keim tell the history of the United States through the development of the American flag, highlighting the myths and facts behind the Stars and Stripes, and the people behind its creation.

The Nation turns to it as an emotional, political, and patriotic symbol in good times and bad. Americans fly it everywhere we live and everywhere we go, from front porches in Florida to pickup trucks in Alaska. We display the red-white-and-blue American flag at festive events to celebrate and, at times of national tragedy, to grieve and show our resolve. We wrap ourselves in it in displays of patriotism, politics, nationalism, and jingoism.

The American flags of our forefathers were beautifully handmade objects that expressed in both craft and design the patriotic sentiments of their makers. "American Flags" presents 70 shining examples of these masterpieces of popular art, with a short, readable essay that gives the history of the flag. 70 illustrations.

Our national anthem celebrates it. Patriots wave it. Politicians of all kinds try to wrap themselves in it. It is saluted at baseball games, in parades, and on the most solemn of commemorative occasions. It was salvaged in the first hours following the dreadful events of September 11, and it stands outstretched just above the surface of the moon. It is, of course, the American flag, and there are few symbols as potent. With all the reverence and sacrifice and emotion it inspires, it is easy to lose sight of the fact that it is ultimately just a symbol. Why is it so powerful? Why does a piece of cloth resonate so loudly for so many? Why a flag, and why this flag, these stripes, those stars? In For Which It Stands, his timely, comprehensive, and engaging "biography" of the American flag, Michael Corcoran examines those questions and more as he explores the evolution of our most cherished emblem, from the days preceding the Revolution through the nationwide resurgence of patriotism in the aftermath of September 11. Corcoran traces the entire life of the colors, holding forth on a number of engrossing topics, including: #149; The fluid design of the flag, the subject of much contentious debate on the part of the founding fathers, and until fairly recently, not officially codified. #149; The various alternative flags ingrained in the national consciousness, among them the defiant, rattlesnake-adorned "Don't Tread on Me" banner and the "Stars and Bars" of the Confederacy. #149; The role of the colors in war, from how to start a fight with England (raising a flag declaring indepen-dence, high enough for the British Army in Boston to see it, ought to do the trick) to the question of whether to remove from the banner the stars emblematic of the states that seceded during the Civil War, to the giddy ubiquity of the flag following World War II. Corcoran addresses all these matters and more (including the particularly vexing questions raised by flag burning: Is it such an affront that it warrants a constitutional amendment outlawing that method of protest, or is it perhaps the single most potent expression of our right to free speech, and therefore profoundly American?) as he delves into the wind-tangled history of "Old Glory," an entertaining jumble of much-loved myth and obscure facts. Thoughtful, droll, and fast-paced, For Which It Stands definitively tells the story of America's most recognizable icon, from Bunker Hill to Iwo Jima to Tranquillity Base -- and beyond.

A must-have third revised and newly expanded edition of the only single reference source for information about state symbols with over 300 information updates and three new chapters. Copyright #169; Libri GmbH. All rights reserved.