By Ryan Schwach<\/p>\n
Earlier this month, the City Council voted unanimously to make Staten Island\u2019s decade-old flag official, codifying it under the city charter. In doing so, the \u201cforgotten borough\u201d became the third of the five boroughs to have its flag enshrined in the annals of city law. <\/p>\n
Meanwhile, Queens\u2019 flag, which is more than a century old, remains off the books. <\/p>\n
Codifying the flag in city law would be nothing more than a gesture. But for Staten Island Councilmember Frank Morano, who pushed the codifying of his borough\u2019s flag, it was even more than that. <\/p>\n
\u201cI think that there is something meaningful about symbols,\u201d he said. <\/p>\n
The World\u2019s Borough has had its blue and white, flower-adorned flag unofficially representing the county since 1913. It\u2019s a beautiful but rogue banner with no legal legitimacy behind it. <\/p>\n
But that may soon change. <\/p>\n
Three Queens councilmembers recently submitted separate legislative requests to codify the flag, beginning the process that could end with it being enshrined in law alongside the banners of Staten Island, Brooklyn and the Bronx. <\/p>\n
\u201cI strongly support codifying an official Queens flag into law,\u201d Councilmember Selvena Brooks-Powers, who filed a request to make the flag official in June, recently told the Eagle. \u201cQueens deserves an official symbol that reflects our history, identity, and pride, and when this legislation comes before the Council, I am confident it will receive broad support from my colleagues.\u201d<\/p>\n
Councilmember Phil Wong has also filed a request, inspired by the successful efforts of Staten Island\u2019s three-person delegation. <\/p>\n
Councilmember Joann Ariola put in a request to make the flag law after the Eagle asked about her thoughts on the effort. <\/p>\n
“Queens deserves a flag of its own,\u201d Ariola told the Eagle in a statement. \u201cIt is well past time that Queens is properly represented as well, and I have submitted a legislative request to make it happen.”<\/p>\n
Councilmembers Vickie Paladino and Jim Gennaro also both told the Eagle they would support a bill to make Queens\u2019 flag official. <\/p>\n
“The flag of Queens is actually quite lovely, with very simple symbology in commemoration of our history and founding as a borough,\u201d said Paladino. \u201cI keep one behind my desk in my district office, in fact, and I love to explain its meaning to people who ask about it. I honestly had no idea it was never actually codified, but I’d be happy to sponsor legislation to do that.\u201d <\/p>\n
Queens Borough President Donovan Richards, who flies the flag over Borough Hall, also said he would support the efforts. <\/p>\n
\u201cOur flag has always and will forever fly high at Borough Hall and all across Queens,\u201d said the BP. \u201cBut should legislation be officially introduced to codify our borough’s flag into law, I would happily support it.”<\/p>\n
A sewer scandal and the history of Queens\u2019 flag <\/p>\n
Queens\u2019 flag was created in 1913, around 15 years after Queens, Brooklyn and Staten Island consolidated with Manhattan and the Bronx to form New York City. <\/p>\n
But despite its age, it\u2019s never been put on the books. <\/p>\n
While the flag seemed destined for official status at the time of its inception, a scandal and decades of political inertia killed all momentum toward cementing the banner into law. <\/p>\n
The flag began as a joint effort between the newly formed Queens Chamber of Commerce and then-Borough President Maurice Connolly, whose powerful political career would soon end in scandal. <\/p>\n
The officials began crafting the flag when Queens was \u201cbecoming a real entity in the world, in the country, in the city of New York,\u201d said Queens Borough Historian Jason Antos.<\/p>\n
Connolly hired Rodman J. Pearson, a designer with the New York City Department of Sewers, to sketch out the first designs of the banner, along with a committee of other bureaucrats and prominent Queens figures of the time. <\/p>\n
The New York Historical Society acted as a governing body of the project, and had final say over the design\u2019s approval, which would be granted based, in part, off of the design\u2019s historical accuracy. <\/p>\n
The society shot down the committee\u2019s first draft of the flag, which depicted two coats of arms on a light blue background. One was the family crest of Willem Kieft, the Dutch governor who purchased Queens from the indigenous population living there. The other belonged to the English governor who lorded over Queens when it was made a county in the late 1600s. <\/p>\n
\u201cThey semi-rejected it,\u201d Antos said. \u201cThey felt that it made sense, but they made improvements upon it. <\/p>\n
The committee\u2019s next attempt proved to be more successful \u2013 and became the flag that flies over the borough today. <\/p>\n
The design introduced the blue and white stripes, representing the old flag of New Amsterdam, and was adorned with a yellow tulip to represent the Dutch, and a red rose for the British. The flowers had additional meaning \u2013 one of the borough\u2019s first major industries was commercial plant nurseries, Antos said. <\/p>\n
The flowers on the flag were surrounded by wampum beads, in honor of the indigenous tribes of Queens. The flag also included the British crown in its top left corner to honor Queen Catherine of Braganza \u2013 the English monarch who the borough is reportedly named after \u2013 and the year 1898, when Queens became a part of the developing metropolis of New York City. <\/p>\n
Connolly wanted to use the flag as a \u201crallying point,\u201d of sorts, a beacon of a new Queens that coincided with a surge of development in the borough that included the creation of the subway system. <\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"By Ryan Schwach Earlier this month, the City Council voted unanimously to make Staten Island\u2019s decade-old flag official,…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":332006,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[39],"tags":[9,24,63,134,136,135],"class_list":["post-332005","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-staten-island","tag-new-york","tag-new-york-city","tag-nyc","tag-staten-island","tag-staten-island-headlines","tag-staten-island-news"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/332005","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=332005"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/332005\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/332006"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=332005"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=332005"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=332005"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}