May
22
Old Glory still an inspiration
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Moore, Oklahoma resident Jim Stubblefield raises an American flag over the rubble the day after the tornado hit.
I am so proud of the product I sell, the American flag. Since its inception, it has been a source of comfort for so many. You see it flown proudly and defiantly at almost all natural and man-made disasters. Looking at the destructive pictures of the Oklahoma tornado, and seeing the helpful men and women hoist a flag in solidarity brings tears to my eyes, even still after 39 years of selling the US flag.
Listening to Jessica Buchanan, on 60 minutes, recount her rescue from Somalia by Seal Team 6 and having them gently place her in a helicopter and hand her a tri-folded American flag to hug and comfort her on the way back to the states, gave me chills.
Talking to my priest, who never really knew his father, but upon hearing of his death was given his father’s casket flag, a war hero, reminds me how important the US flag is to us all.
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Jul
6
Another Flag Season Has Come and Gone!
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Well, with the Fourth of July behind us we have made it through another flag season here at Arkansas’ FlagandBanner.com.? And I am happy to report it was a fabulous one!!!? So far this year we have met all our monthly goals and are up almost 15% for the year!
A big THANK YOU to all our wonderful customers!!!
Kerry McCoy
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Mar
22
Old State House Needs Your Help in Preserving Historic Flags
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Karen Martin
Fri, 19 Mar 2010 10:11 CDT
The Old State House Museum recently added two flags to its Arkansas Civil War Flag Collection.
The flags are currently mounted on linen and encased in dark netting to keep the aged, fragile fabric intact. These antiquated methods of conservation prevent the ventilation of the fabric and expose the flags to further deterioration.
Both flags must be cleaned and preserved using modern conservation techniques. The museum’s goal is to conserve these two flags in time for exhibition in 2012 during Arkansas’s commemoration of the Sesquicentennial of America’s Civil War.
* Cost of conserving the newly acquired Consolidated 6th & 7th Arkansas Infantry Regiment Flag : $11,154
*? Cost of conserving the newly acquired Hart’s Battery (or Dallas Artillery) Flag: $14,727
* Total Conservation Costs: $25,881
Can you help? Contributions may be mailed to:
Save the Flags, Old State House Museum, 300 West Markham St., Little Rock, AR, 72201.
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Jun
15
Flag Day Extended by Obama
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This year, instead of Flag Day being one day, President Obama has issued a proclamation making Flag Day a week long. That would make it Flag Week. Yippee!
Every year the current President issues proclamations for all the different holidays. It is crazy how many proclamations are made each day. If your interested check out www.whitehouse.gov
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May
27
Flag Season at FlagandBanner.com
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It is here…”Christmas” for Flag Dealers! Yep, the Flag Season has officially arrived. It started the week before Memorial Day, goes through Flag Day in June, and ends after July 4.
My neighbors, the Blairs, are on it. This week they decorated their old home with vintage bunting from FlagandBanner.com. They have a 1930 home with cream paint and red brick. The vintage bunting looks fabulous! People stop and ask them, “Where did you get the antique looking decorations and are they really old?” Dan Blair tells them he found it in the attic and it is from the first World Fair. Man he is a good B S’r.
I put the traditional red, white and blue bunting on my house. There is so much to choose from now days, you can go crazy. But if you don’t want to make any decisions you can keep it simply by buying one of our many home decorating kits.
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Feb
20
Super Bowl and Our Flags
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We see our flags everywhere, around town, when we travel, in the newspaper, on TV and in the movies. This past Super Bowl Sunday we contributed to the game, you wouldn’t even know you were seeing our product if we didn’t point it out. This is a fun little thing to know about us. We make and sell the little flags that go on top of almost all the goal posts you see on TV. The following article is about Sportsfield, to whom we sell our goal post flags to.
On The Bright Side: Delhi plays a part in Super Bowl
By Patricia Breakey
Delhi News Bureau
DELHI _ A group of 18 to 20 people from Sportsfield Specialties in Delhi headed for the Super Bowl are hoping that on Sunday, they’ll view not only the game, but the goal posts.
The goal posts at University of Phoenix Stadium in Glendale, Ariz., were custom-made at the Delhi plant, according to Wayne Oliver, Sportsfield Specialties Inc. president.
“We can’t wait to see our goal posts,” said Debbie Oliver, a company employee and Wayne’s wife. “It’s going to be great.” Wayne Oliver said the group would probably have gone to the Super Bowl, but “our goal posts are just another good reason to be there.”
When the ball sails across the end zone, said Michael P. Zambito, modular products business unit manager, he will be thinking to himself, “That is one nice set of goal posts.”
The posts are the Sportsfield Specialties’ AdjustRight model, which are the company’s largest sales volume product, Wayne Oliver said. There are hundreds of the posts installed across the country, he said, including in Delhi on the Delaware Academy and Delhi Central School football field.
“They are the most specified goals posts by far,” Oliver said. “We are the nation’s largest manufacturer of goal posts.”
He said that when the University of Phoenix Stadium was being designed, semi-custom goal posts that could be easily taken down were needed. This was to accommodate the movement of the natural grass field outside, where it could be watered and fertilized and receive natural sunlight.
He said to move the tray that the field grows in, the goal posts must be removed, replaced and uprights adjusted.
Zambito said that because the NFL’s Arizona Cardinals host many televised games, it was essential for them to have perpendicular/parallel uprights on the goal post with the ability to quickly and easily adjust them.
Sportsfield’s AdjustRight provided this capability by a simple adjustment of hardware, versus pulling out roll pins, drilling new holes, adjusting to level then inserting new pins, Zambito said.
Oliver said that when the posts are being constructed, “almost everyone in the factory works on them, so that makes this a neat small-town story that Delhi has a part in the Super Bowl.”
During the construction process, the post had to be painted the distinctive florescent National Football League yellow, Oliver said.
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Oct
18
Flag Convention 07′
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Yep, even flag dealers have an association: the NIFDA, National Independent Flag Dealers Association. We met in Scottsdale, AZ this year. If you don’t golf or shop, there is absolutely nothing to do but lay around the pool and drink in Scottsdale. Not all bad, just boring. Scottsdale is one place I can check off my list. Thank goodness I don’t have to visit that city ever again.
At the flag convention I learned some stuff, got rejuvenated and networked with old friends. The flag business is a small group of friendly competitors. Some of us buy from each other, some of us compete against each other.
Every year the same old topics come up: buy American, keep the mass merchandisers out of the flag business, and keep the government out of the flag business. If you think about it, it is silly for the government to buy flags out of tax dollars just so the legislators can give them away to their constituents. It’s kinda like buying votes. Some states even have the prisoners sewing American flags. That is almost like buying from China ’cause it takes away jobs.
Our first speaker sounded like Paul Harvey and looked like Grady’s dad (my father-n-law). He was a little behind the times… he kept talking about the importance of sending ‘thank you’ cards. It’s true, but that is old news. And to keep us till the end, the old codger had the nerve to keep us all dangling for the big bang that will revolutionize our business: Jesus Christ. OMG! We had Jewish people in the crowd!
After the sleepy shift (lunch), the Internet lady came and gave a big talk on the internet. What I learned was the importance of incorporating You Tube into your website. After this we put our “How to Install a Flagpole” commercial on You Tube.
The heart breaker of the convention was the man whose son died in Iraq. He made a commemorative flag for his son, and Valley Forge is producing the flag. The act of getting a large company like Valley Forge to manufacturer and sell a flag made by an individual is not an easy thing to do. He cried through his whole presentation and every dealer there bought some of his flags. Here is his flag
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Feb
19
Presidents Day Surprise
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Today I met a man that made me proud to be an American, MSGT Jeff Vaughn. Jeff is a career Air National Gaurdsman. He has been activated 3 times (which is not enough by his standards) once in Dessert Storm and twice in our current Fight For Freedom. He just returned from a tour of duty in Afghanistan where his crew did humanitarian drops of supplies to soldiers and civilians on the ground.
Jeff is a shining example of why servicemen are called servicemen, because they serve! not just our country but everyone they come in contact with.
Today he served me by bringing me a flag I gave him to take on his plane during his missions, I thought it nice to have a little bit of home to go with him as he flew over enemy territory and boy did it go. This flag flew 25 combat missions in Afghanistan, Pakistan, Tajikistan, and Kyrgyzstan.
To show his gratitude he designed and built me an oak case with a glass front and framed that worldly flag with a certificate he created using logos and the crew’s names and signatures.
He said he appreciated what we did, not just giving him a flag but promoting patriotism. I said I appreciated all his service and family sacrifice. That is when he said, “It’s not a service that we do; it’s a way of life”.
I was humbled.
Posted by kerry
Flag and BannerHome
Nov
10
To sell or not to sell?
Filed Under Flag News | 2 Comments
Since becoming a grandmother 4 months ago the world seems to have tilted on its axis. No longer am I feeling the need to beat the clock but rather I want to sit with my new grandbaby and slow the world down.
I have even been contemplating selling a portion of my first born, Arkansas Flag and Banner. I wonder what it is worth?
Posted by kerry
Flag and BannerHome
Jan
25
Ohio’s flag has no square corners – and not one pointy end, like a pennant, but two.
Even a road map has four 90-degree corners to work with. As do the flags of each and every one of the 49 other states, by the way.
It is quite a challenge.
Particularly when you consider the rules that Weinstock established for the brain teaser. The procedure would take two people and be completed with precisely 17 folds.
The first specification was practical. The second was symbolic: Ohio was the 17th state to join the Union.
The American flag, while we’re on the subject, folds 13 times, representing the original 13 colonies, and into a triangle – a tip of the hat to the head wear that the Blue coats wore in the American Revolution.
But transforming a rectangle into a triangle is child’s play compared with the geometric gymnastics of getting a swallow-tail strip of fabric into a neat rectangle. Emphasis on neat.
Cleveland.com and Ohio.com
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