Photos courtesy of Dennis Smith.
Bixby Knolls resident Dennis Smith was never one to hang a tired American flag outside his home. Once it was remotely tattered or worn, he replaced it with a new flag–eventually prompting his wife to ask a very simple question, “What are you going to do with all these old flags?”
There is an etiquette to retiring flags that, according to the U.S. Flag Code, requires it be done in a dignified way, preferably by cutting and burning it. Smith knew of this but found that, be it through Veterans Association or the Boy Scouts, no organization in Long Beach formally engaged in the process.
Smith contacted Blair Cohn of the Bixby Knolls Business Improvement Association in 2011, and soon began collecting damaged flags as part of the neighborhood’s monthly First Fridays celebration. After finding a local Boy Scout troop to help collect the flags, they began what is now an annual tradition of properly retiring American flags.
“The response from the community was incredible,” Smith said. “I recall one woman who had several flags–seven or eight–each one properly folded into a triangle and each sealed in a Ziploc bag. One man handed me his folded flag and as we both held it he told me his story of being a veteran, of flying his flag every day and taking it down every evening, and of what it meant to him to raise it each morning and lower it each evening.”
This deep sense of pride is something that is not only seemingly innate within Smith, it is something he does not downplay on any level. At a time when some are hesitant to express “too much” national pride, Smith believes that this is a minority within the U.S.
“There are those who may feel a lack of national pride, for whatever their reasons may be,” Smith said. “That is not the case for the vast majority of our nation’s citizens… While not always happy with the actions of their government, they are very proud of their country, and because of that, our flag. Think about what our flag stands for, not only to us as Americans, but to the world. For over two hundred years the Stars and Bars have represented liberty, freedom, opportunity. Pride in our country doesn’t have to be part of anyone’s civic life, but thankfully it is—for many Americans.”
Having gone to high school in Brussels, Belgium, Smith knows all too well the image that the U.S. holds on a larger, global scale. During his foreign education, which ended in 1980, he watched Americans being held hostage in Iran while Russia invaded Afghanistan to support a multitude of terrorist organizations that expressed deep-seated anti-Western sentiments.
“I was able to see America from abroad and see the lack of freedom experienced by citizens in other nations,” Smith recollected. “For Christmas my senior year, my mother gave me a very large American flag–some six- by four-feet–that I hung on my wall across from my bed. The last thing I saw at night and the first thing I saw in the morning, the flag of my native country that was thousands of miles away geographically and ideologically from where I was. It ended up being the last gift my mom ever gave me as she passed away several months later. What she gave me was the symbol of freedom that is recognized around the world, a symbol that represented me and that I was, and am, extremely proud of. That sounds corny to many, but it is true to many more.”
Smith’s attachment to our country’s flag is one that reminds us of the many things we often take for granted, including the idea of choice.
For Smith, we have choices: the choice to be proud, the choice to be engaged, the choice to be respectful of what a country’s flag stands for. And for those who haven’t witnessed a flag retirement ceremony, he encourages you to partake.
“People choose whether to be proud of our country or not,” Smith said. “Personally, I am very proud, and even more grateful, to be an American. Is our country perfect? No. Have there been mistakes made domestically and internationally since the Declaration of Independence was signed 237 years ago this week? Yes… Our flag represents our ability to disagree with our government, our ability to exercise ‘certain unalienable Rights’ endowed by our Creator, and guaranteed by men and women who serve in uniform under our flag. And whether you are very proud or less proud of our nation and its flag, that flag that represents you deserves respect and part of that respect is to properly dispose, or retire, your flag when it is too battered to fly any more.”
For those wishing to properly retire their worn flags, Smith and Boy Scout Troop 29 will be collecting them on Friday, July 5, in the parking lot of Nino’s Italian Restaurant, located at 3853 Atlantic Avenue in Bixby Knolls. The ceremony will begin at 8PM.
For more information, visit http://www.denniscsmith.com/flagretirement. For more information about flag etiquette, click here.
{FG_GEOMAP [33.8286125,-118.18534290000002] FG_GEOMAP}
NOTE: This article originally quoted Mr. Smith as using ‘Constitution’ rather than ‘Creator’; Mr. Smith requested a retraction since he was directly quoting the Declaration of Independence which states, “We hold these truths to be self-evident, that all men are created equal, that they are endowed by their Creator with certain unalienable Rights…” The quote was altered only for clarification purposes, as “certain unalienable rights” has been connotatively associated with broad Constitutional and civil rights though denotationally and directly assocated with the Declaration.