U.S. 42 Stars Flag unusual variant made by Sarah McFadden.
The venerable New York flag maker Sarah McFadden of S.McFadden Co., which occupied 198 Hudson Street, in lower Manhattan, for over 70 years, made this hand-sewn wool flag. According to contemporary accounts the company was a favorite of the Army, the Navy, the NY State Guard, the Sound Steamers, the Hudson Riverboats Companies and private yachtsmen.
The S. McFadden & Co. was founded in 1834, and made flags of all types right into the early 20th century. The New York Times reported that Sally Ann McFadden, likely her mother or aunt, made and sold some of the first American flags produced in New York City; and in the 1890s was locally known as the Betsy Ross of New York.
From the Hudson street shop the S. McFadden Co. advertised stock in the city directories of the day which included; National flags, Maritime Flags, Eagles, Jacks, Flags, Stands of Colors, Pendants, Buntings, as well as Marryats, Rogers and Commercial Signal Codes in the city directories of the day. They could also produce embroidered and painted Fancy flags on short notice.
The company made numerous flags during the American Civil War, for both sides! One bullet riddled Confederate flag was returned to New York as a battle trophy by an officer only to have the flag's handywork identified as a product of the McFadden shop! Apparently a quantity of Confederate flags were made in New York and shipped South during the war, the McFadden Co. stock amongst them.
After the war, in August 1870, the company made what was believed to be the largest United States flag made to date; a behemoth measuring at 50 x 110 from silk and created for the flamboyant Colonel Jim Fisk of the 9th New York Infantry for placement in their encampment at Long Branch near Sandy Hook, New Jersey. It took 12 McFadden seamstresses and five weeks to make the $600 flag, which exceeded the capacity of the shop and had to be finished out-of-doors.
Once finished, the great flag was transported to the National Guard encampment and Ms. McFadden and the shop girls were invited to the flag's inaugural hoisting. It was raised upon a tall, spliced pole, but there was insufficient morning wind to float it fully aloft. Later in the day a huge wind finally arrived, but the huge flag had its fly-end entangled in the halyards, effectively becoming a large sail which snapped the pole! One half of the pole, with flag attached, was carried out to sea and forever lost.
This flag currently bears 42 five point stars, but the placement of four of the stars in-between the rows of stars along the hoist edge make it likely that this was originally a 38 star flag which was then later modified, perhaps by McFadden but more likely by the owner to accommodate the admission of the 39th, 40th, 41st and 42nd states of North Dakota, South Dakota, Montana and Washington in 1889.
The exact history of this flag is unknown; but, eventually, it became part of the of the acclaimed collection belonging to noted antique dealer Mr. Boleslaw Mastai and his wife Marie-Louise d'Otrange Mastai, formerly of New York City, and later Amagansett, Long Island. Their collection was the result of fifty years of careful research and study by the husband-wife team. Mastai started collecting in the mid-20th century and amassed the greatest private flag collection in the United States which he detailed in his ground-breaking book The Stars and The Stripes; The American Flag from Birth of the Republic to the Present, published by Alfred Knopf, New York 1973, which became highly praised for its recognition of the American Flag as art and as social history.
ZFC Significant Flag
Provenance:
• Made by Sarah McFadden, New York, NY, circa 1876 & 1890s..
• Acquired by Mr. & Mrs. Boleslaw & Marie-Louise d'Otrange Mastai, New York City, and Amagansett, NY, The Mastai Collection, until 2002.
• Sold via Sotheby's Auction in New York City to the Zaricor Flag Collection, 2002.
Sources:
Madaus, Howard M.- Whitney Smith, The American Flag: Two Centuries of Concord and Conflict, VZ Publications, Santa Cruz, 2006.
U.S. Flags With Unofficial Number Of Stars, Flags of the World, 12 November 2011, from: http://www.crwflags.com/fotw/flags/us-unoff.html
Advertising Cover of Flag Maker Sarah McFadden, LiveAuctioneers, 12 November 2011, from: http://www.liveauctioneers.com/item/4813129
Wilson, H., Trow's New York City directory, New York, John M. Trow, Publisher, 1857.
Wilson, H., Trow's New York City directory, New York, John M. Trow, Publisher, 1872.
Image Credits:
Zaricor Flag Collection
Live Auctioneers
Wilson, H., Trow's New York City Directory, New York, John M. Trow, Publisher, 1872
