This Sunday, June 14, is Flag Day. On June 14, 1777 Congress adopted the Stars and Stripes as the flag of the United States of America. For more than 100 years after that date, however, there was no official holiday to commemorate the flag and its significance.
Bernard J. Cigrand, a young teacher working at the Stoney Hill School near Fredonia, Wisconsin, began the process that eventually led to the recognition of June 14 as Flag Day.
Today is the 162nd birthday of the Smithsonian Institute. On August 10, 1846, President James Polk signed an Act passed by Congress establishing the Smithsonian as a trust, to be administered by a Board of Trustees and a Secretary of the Institution. The impetus for this Act was a bequest by a British scientist, James Smithson, who left his estate to his nephew, unless his nephew died without heirs in which case the estate went to the United States of America to “found at Washington, an establishment for the increase and diffusion of knowledge among men.”