Municipal flags bring glory to cities
Everyone can picture the American flag. Many people can imagine their state’s banner. But how many can describe the municipal flag of the city they live in?
Take New York City. While millions of residents, workers and tourists walk around there every day, it’s doubtful that any of them could identify the city’s flag. And it’s definite that they could not guess the number of flagpoles holding those banners.
The answer is more than 1,000, and the city spends around $200,000 annually to keep them in shape. On a rotating basis, workers fix and repaint about 60 flagpoles annually. One stumbling block is the height of the staffs.
“Flagpoles can be…over 100 feet tall, requiring skilled painting and repair people,” a city spokeswoman told The New York Times. For instance, “a 120-foot flagpole…required re-roping. The repairman was lifted in a boom truck to…maximum height and then had to climb out of the bucket and complete the climb by hand.”
Some of those poles support the municipal flag of Manhattan, defined by the city government as combining “orange, white and blue perpendicular bars…with the standard design of the seal of the city in blue upon the middle white bar, bearing the number 1625.”
The hues imitate the flag of the Netherlands. As a 1950s’ song put it, “Old New York was once New Amsterdam” because pilgrims from Holland came to what is now New York 390 years ago – in 1625.
The circular seal includes these images:
*An eagle, symbolic of the state;
*A Native American, representing the indigenous peoples who preceded the Dutch;
*A sailor with navigational tools, reflective of how the Dutch came to America;
*A beaver, the symbol of the Dutch East India Company, the first business in New Netherlands;
*A windmill, barrel and flour to symbolize industry.
Each of New York City’s five boroughs has its own flag. One example is the elaborate standard of Queens. Three broad horizontal stripes (blue, white, blue) with a crown are inscribed with the words “Queen’s Borough,” and the date 1898, when the borough joined New York City.
The circular seal also includes wampum for the Native peoples, a tulip for the Dutch and a Tudor rose, reflective of the English monarchy that ran the city after the Dutch.
What does your municipal flag look like? If you don’t know, look into it.