Research and news of the North American Vexillological Association March 2018 No. Recherche et nouvelles de l’Association nord-américaine de vexillologie Mars 2018 1 INSIDE Page Editor’s Note 2 President’s Column 3 2017 NAVA Membership Map 3 Steamboat’s a-Comin’: Flags Used Incorporating NAVA News and Flag Research Quarterly Afloat in the Nineteenth Century 4 The Mississippi Identity: Summary of an Academic Project in Flag Design 11 Flag Heritage Foundation: Japanese Heraldry and Heraldic Flags 12 Regional Groups Report: PFA and VAST 12 • Grants Committee Report • Letters • New Flags • Projected Publication Schedule 13 11 Oh Say, Can You See...? 14 Captain William Driver Award Guidelines 16 Treasurer’s Report 16 Flags for the Fallen 18 Annual Meeting Notice, Call for Papers 24 18 4 2 | March 2018 • Vexillum No. 1 March / Mars 2018 Issue 1 / Numéro 1 Editor's Note | Note de la rédaction Dear Reader: No. 1 Welcome to the first edition of Vexillum. Please allow me to explain its origins and our Research and news of the North American plans for it. Vexillological Association / Recherche et NAVA has a long history of publishing for its members and others interested in vexill- nouvelles de l’Association nord-américaine ological matters. NAVA News began in 1967 as a newsletter about association affairs, and de vexillologie. Published quarterly / Publié later expanded its coverage to include reprints of newspaper articles about flags and original quatre fois par an. research papers. Raven has delivered twenty-four volumes of peer-reviewed vexillological Please submit correspondence and research since 1994. In 2013, Flag Research Quarterly was launched to provide a forum for submissions to / Veuillez envoyer toute correspondance à l’adresse suivante: amply illustrated, shorter research articles. At the same time, NAVA News transitioned to Vexillum, Post Office Box 55071 #58049, an online-only publication. Boston, Mass. 02205-5071 USA; While the association sees value in all three of our publications, we are regrettably [email protected] unable to continue publication of NAVA News and Flag Research Quarterly in their current forms. Our budget is simply too tight. Therefore, we are consolidating the best content EDITOR-IN-CHIEF / RÉDACTEUR EN CHEF from both publications into Vexillum. Steven A. Knowlton Vexillum will continue to bring you news about flag events, members of NAVA, and EDITORIAL BOARD / association activities. It will also continue to publish current original research from NAVA COMITÉ DE RÉDACTION members and others, including some of the papers presented at our annual meetings. It will James A. Croft also serve as a forum for official association business, including announcements of our annual John A. Lowe meeting, slates of nominees for officer positions, proposed budgets, and other matters. David B. Martucci We look forward to carrying on the good work published in NAVA News and Flag Christopher Maddish Research Quarterly through our new title, which will be mailed to all NAVA members on a Elijah Snow-Rackley quarterly basis. Peter A. Ansoff (ex officio) In this issue, we are pleased to bring you two articles that were originally slated for Flag Research Quarterly. “Steamboat’s a-Comin’ ”, by Dave Martucci, is a fascinating look at the PUBLICATIONS COMMITTEE / COMITÉ DE PUBLICATION flags used on the steamboats that conveyed passengers around the East Coast in the nine- teenth century. It may shed light on the many “antique”-appearing flags that are available Steven A. Knowlton Chair / Directeur for purchase on the collectors’ market. “Flags for the Fallen” was originally presented at the 2015 Annual Meeting. As Scot Guenter has written and spoken about several times in Kenneth Reynolds recent years, rituals involving flags are an important topic for vexillologists to explore, and Stanley Contrades we hope this addition to the literature proves interesting and useful. Elsewhere, we bring Anne M. Platoff you news from regional flag associations, and some updates on association business, such as Peter A. Ansoff (ex officio) a financial report and information about our upcoming Annual Meeting in Qué bec City. NORTH AMERICAN VEXILLOLOGICAL A note about our title: Vexillum was chosen through a deliberative process. Earlier this year, ASSOCIATION-ASSOCIATION NORD- NAVA president Peter Ansoff invited members to submit suggestions for the title; then NAVA AMÉRICAINE DE VEXILLOLOGIE secretary Ted Kaye organized a poll of NAVA members, in which Vexillum was the most favor- Founded / Fondée en 1967 ably rated choice by a large margin. After consulting with the Publications Committee about Peter A. Ansoff the attributes of a title that are desirable, the Executive Board rated their top choices from the President / Président submitted titles, and Vexillum also came out on top. After a thorough discussion at the March Luc V. Baronian board meeting, a consensus emerged that Vexillum was the right choice. First Vice President / Premier vice-président “Vexillum,” of course, is the root of the English word vexillology. In Latin, it refers not Steven A. Knowlton to a flag as flown in modern times, but rather to a cloth suspended from a crossbar attached Second Vice President / Deuxième vice-président to a lance carried by Roman cavalry units.1 In classical Latin, the word was probably Edward B. Kaye pronounced “weks-ill-oom” with an accent on the second syllable. The traditional English Secretary / Secrétaire pronunciation (“Anglo-Latin”) is “vex-ill-umm”, also with an accent on the second James J. Ferrigan III syllable. We look forward to hearing all the ways that you care to say it! Treasurer / Trésorier Please let us know how you like our new publication. We welcome all correspondence © 2018 North American Vexillological Association- and submissions at [email protected]. Association nord-américaine de vexillologie. All rights reserved / Tous droits réservés. The opinions Yours in vexillology, expressed by individual articles in this publication belong to their authors and do not necessarily Steve Knowlton, Editor represent those of the editor or the Association / Les opinions exprimées dans la présente publication n’engagent que leurs auteurs et ne sont pas 1 Marcus E. V. Schmöger has a thorough description of “The Roman Vexillum” in the Proceedings of the 20th Interna- nécessairement celles de l’éditeur ou de l’Association. tional Congress of Vexillology, at http://internationalcongressesofvexillology-proceedingsandreports.yolasite.com Recherche et nouvelles de l’Association nord-américaine de vexillologie Vexillum No. 1 • mars 2018 | 3 President’s Column | Chronique du président Dear fellow NAVAns, Welcome to the first issue of Vexillum. As Steve Knowlton are our product, and that providing them on time is part of your explains in the Editor’s Column, this new publication replaces expectation as a NAVA member. both Flag Research Quarterly and NAVA News, and will feature Enjoy Vexillum! the types of content that previously appeared in both. This consolidation will make our publication process cheaper and Peter Ansoff more efficient, and will also satisfy the desire (expressed by many President, NAVA members) for a return to a print version of NAVA News. In some [email protected] respects, Vexillum will be similar to what NAVA News was before the previous publications policy was adopted in 2012: a selection 1 Whitney Smith, Flags Through the Ages and Across the World (New York: McGraw- Hill, 1975), 30 (emphasis added). of high-quality illustrated research articles as well as coverage of flag-related current events, members’ doings, humor, and infor- mation about NAVA itself. In addition to the practical NAVA Membership Map aspects of our new publication, At 12/31/17, NAVA has 468 members: there’s an important philosophical 343 Active (individual) dimension to it. Ever since I’ve 50 Student (in school over 17) been a NAVA member, there’s been 23 Associate (spouse or under 18) tension between two competing 47 Organizational (commercial) ideas of what our association is supposed to be, and what it’s 5 Honorary supposed to do. On one hand is our mission to “promote vexil- 468 Total Members lology as the scientific study of flags,” as stated in our Articles of NAVA also provides its publications to over 70 other institutions, Incorporation. On the other is the reality that an international including FIAV members, university libraries, and institutional subscribers. membership organization needs to attract a critical mass of paying members to exist and operate, and that our members will NAVA members hail from five Canadian provinces and nearly every U.S. state (none currently in HI, ID, LA, ND, or WY). have many diverse flag-related interests. This dichotomy is not unique to NAVA or to vexillology. The chairman of the Airship Members by Country 2 United Kingdom 1 Greece Association in the United Kingdom, to which I also belong, said 408 USA 1 Argentina 1 Japan this in his most recent message to members: 30 Canada 1 Belgium 1 New Zealand 4 Australia 1 Brazil 1 Norway “My personal feeling is that in the past we have taken 3 Germany 1 Cameroon 1 Singapore ourselves too seriously and this is evidenced by the fact that 3 Italy 1 Chile 1 Spain we are seen…as boring, stuffy and old-fashioned. … We have 2 Mexico 1 China 1 Sweden missed the point that the Association is not composed of 2 Switzerland 1 France 468 Total airships, it is made up of people who are interested in airships and [,] in my experience, people join organizations, for the Members by 15 MD 2 AR most part, in order to have fun.” Province: CANADA 14 NJ 2 IA 18 ON 13 MN 2 MS This is not, of course, to belittle our scholarly mission in any 6 BC 13 UT 2 MT way—it remains the core of what we are, and we can be justly 3 QC 12 WA 2 NH proud of what we have achieved in our first half-century of 2 AB 10 DC 2 RI existence.