deliriouslove1970. The life & times of Gary and Denise Flanders. (Free and worth every penny. If you would like to compliment the editor, send to garytheflan@deliriouslove1970.com. If you would like to complain, call your mother.)

The fifth smallest, by land area, tenth least populated state: New Hampshire. A beautiful state in the Northeast.

New Hampshire was the first colony to say to Great Britain, ‘ya, we aren’t a part of you anymore’, which they did in January 1776.

If you have never seen this state in the fall, you have missed one of the most spectacular displays of fall foliage. We took a trip here for our 25th anniversary [which is now 25 years ago.]

The flag we have now was adopted in 1931. It has basically been the same since 1776. It was modified slightly when the state seal was modified and from 1909 – 1931 the seal looked like this:

Both the 1931 and the 1909 flag feature the Frigate USS Raleigh, one of the first US warships ever built which was built in Portsmouth Harbor. The current flag has a laurel wreath surrounding the ship, representing Fame; Honor and Victory. There are 9 stars standing for New Hampshire being the 9th state to join the Union. The yellow spit of land represents granite which is a strong igneous rock that is symbolic of the strong, sturdy people. The water is for Portsmouth Harbor.

The reason the flag was altered in 1931 is because the then governor thought the old flag, with the soldiers loading rum barrels was sending the wrong message during prohibition, so the rum barrels were eliminated.

Both flags were a simple (and boring) blue field with the state seal superimposed in the center. The North American Vexillological Association (NAVA) considered all 50 state flags, added in all of the US Territories and then Canadian provinces and came up with 72 flags. New Hampshire ranked number 63. It is not well thought of due to the breaking of the Good Flag/Bad Flag rule of no state seals.

In 2000 there was some thought to changing the flag to a more modern and ‘correct’ representation of the state. The proponents wanted a field with the image of the famous landmark, The Old Man Of the Mountain.

But, and it is a BIG but, in 2003, the dang thing fell off…it is just plain gone. Oh well. So, we have what we have.