U.S. 36 Star Parade Stick Flag.
This is cotton gauze, 36 star stick flag. The canton contains 36 white, 5-pointed stars, set in six horizontal rows of six stars each, which are visible on each side. Small printed parade flags like this printed cotton gauze example were extremely popular during the American Civil War. Usually waved at parades, rallies and sanitary fairs, these flags were widely used by civilians to demonstrate support for the war effort.
Small flags that are still mounted on their original staff, such as this, are rare due to their ephemeral nature. The 36 star US flags became official on the 4th of July 1865. However, flag making entrepreneurs made them available as soon as statehood for Nevada loomed on the national horizon in 1863. 36 star flags like this example were widely available in April of 1865 to celebrate Confederate General Lee's surrender at Appomattox and again to mourn the assassination of President Abraham Lincoln, both of which are among the most significant events in United States history.
The 6 x 6 rectilinear patterns was the most popular star field for use on the 36 star flag, which would remain current until the admission of Nebraska in 1867.
Provenance: Acquired by the Zaricor Flag Collection in 2002 from the Mastai Flag Collection through auction at Sotheby's of New York City.
ZFC Noteworthy Flag
Item is Framed
Sources:
Mastai, Boleslaw and Marie-Louise D'Otrange, The Stars and The Stripes: The American Flag as Art and as History from the Birth of the republic to the Present, Knopf, New York, 1973.
36 Star Flags, Flags of the World, 27 April, 2012, from: http://www.crwflags.com/fotw/flags/us-1865.html
Image Credits:
Zaricor Flag Collection
