This Day in History: The Father of Flag Day
On this day in 1866, Bernard J. Cigrand is born. He is considered by many to be the Father of Flag Day.
What would Cigrand think of modern-day refusals to salute the flag as our national anthem is sung? After all, those protests are pretty much the opposite of what he spent his entire life working towards.
Cigrand was the youngest child of Nicholas and Susan Cigrand, immigrants from Luxembourg. The elder Cigrands loved their new country. “They instilled that love of the country in [Bernard] and really took it to the pinnacle,” Cigrand’s great-granddaughter later explained.
Cigrand had to work hard to make his way, but work hard he did. At various points, he sold scrap iron and rags, worked as a sales agent, and worked on a steam barge. He taught and sold books to pay his way through dental school.
He was apparently an excellent dentist later in life, but it was the teaching job that left its mark.
In 1885, Bernard J. Cigrand was teaching in a one-room schoolhouse in Waubeka, Wisconsin. He’d devised a simple class exercise for his students: They were to write essays about the flag in commemoration of the flag’s birthday on June 14.
Sometimes, the simplest of things can turn into a lifetime quest, can’t they? For Cigrand, this simple class exercise turned into a lifelong effort to obtain a national flag holiday.
One year later, in 1886, he wrote an article for a Chicago paper, urging that the flag’s birthday be observed annually. He would eventually author hundreds of articles advocating for the June 14 holiday, and he delivered many speeches. By 1894, he had achieved a public school celebration of Flag Day in Chicago. More than 300,000 children attended! Many more private and state-level celebrations ensued over the next two decades.
On May 30, 1916, with American involvement in World War I looming on the horizon, President Woodrow Wilson formalized something that people were doing on their own anyway. He issued a presidential proclamation declaring that June 14, 1916, would be the first annual national Flag Day celebration.
“Let us on that day rededicate ourselves,” he wrote, “to the nation, ‘one and inseparable’ from which every thought that is not worthy of our fathers' first vows in independence, liberty, and right shall be excluded . . . .”
Cigrand unfortunately did not live long enough to see the end of the tale, because he died unexpectedly in 1932. Seventeen years later, President Harry Truman finally signed a congressional act that officially designated June 14 as Flag Day.
What an AMERICAN story—and what a wonderful demonstration of what one determined individual can accomplish.
A note for those who are interested: Some of you might know I am running an experiment in history reels. If you are so inclined, check out my YouTube channel and/or subscribe to those HERE. Don’t miss the reel I created about one of John Paul Jones's legendary victories, posted over the weekend.
Primary Sources:
John R. Vile, The American Flag: An Encyclopedia of the Stars and Stripes in U.S. History, Culture, and Law (2018)
Journals of the Continental Congress (June 14, 1777)
Marc Leepson, Flag: An American Biography (2005)
Woodrow Wilson, Proclamation 1335—Flag Day (May 30, 1916)
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