After July 4, 1776, the people of the colonies felt the need of a national flag to symbolize their new spirit of unity and independence.

The following resolution was adopted in Congress on June 14, 1777:

Resolved, that the flag of the thirteen United States be thirteen stripes, alternate red and white; that the union be thirteen stars, white on a blue field.

       Betsy Ross, a flagmaker of Philadelphia, is credited by some historians with having made the first flag of the United States, and with having suggested that the stars be five-pointed. The thirteen stars were arranged in a circle.

There is a legend that the first flag of this design ever to fly over a United States military post was made of pieces cut from a white shirt, an old blue jacket, and some strips of red cloth from the petticoat of a soldier's wife.