American School

The ship’s flag represents the Grand Luminary, or Great Star, pattern. Captain Samuel Reid proposed the design of a cluster of stars in a star arrangement around 1815 in order to enhance the flag’s visibility at sea and to allow for the preservation of the same basic pattern as the number of stars grew during this period of nation building. Although President Monroe rejected Reid's proposal, the practice of making flags with stars arranged in this fashion was commonplace, particularly among mariners, from 1820 up until the Civil War. The height of production, as evidenced by the most prevalent inclusion of twenty six stars, was the period between Michigan and Florida’s admission to the union from 1837 to 1845.