Two days ago, the entire United States celebrated the 235th anniversary of the adoption of the American flag. National Flag Day, now part of National Flag Week, is celebrated on June 14 each year in remembrance of a resolution that was passed by the Second Continental Congress on that day in 1777.  The United States Army also celebrates its birthday on June 14, since on that date in 1775, Congress adopted the “the American Continental Army”.
In 1886, Bernard J. Cigrand first publicly proposed an annual observance of the birth of the United States flag in an article titled “The Fourteenth of June,” published in the Chicago Argus newspaper. Cigrand spent much of his life promoting the establishment of the holiday and was living in Chicago when on the third Saturday in June 1894, a public school children’s celebration of Flag Day, took place at Douglas, Garfield, Humboldt, Lincoln and Washington parks. More than 300,000 children participated and the celebration was repeated the next year. Cigrand is generally credited with being the “Father of Flag Day,” with the Chicago Tribune noting that he “almost single-handedly” established the holiday.