Bangor event celebrates Flag Day

BANGOR – Wearing a sweat shirt with a red, white and blue motif over her “God Bless America” T-shirt, Marlene Doucette, 71, of Orono, covered her heart with her right hand as an American Flag was carried in front of her.

Called “colors” while carried on foot, an “ensign” when flown on a boat and a “standard” if mounted on a land vehicle, the American flag is one of the most recognizable symbols associated with the United States.

“There’s not enough respect from the younger generation,” Doucette said Wednesday evening at the Bangor Flag Day ceremony held at the Bangor Waterfront. Doucette said she’s participated in a number of parades and that today’s youth do not honor their nation’s emblem as it passes before them. “Half of them don’t take their hats off,” she said.

Event organizer Judy Butler, 70, of Eddington said that she was disgusted by a string of flag burnings in 1989 and decided to start organizing a Flag Day event in retaliation. Butler believes that Americans don’t respect the flag enough, or the nation it represents.

“We gripe and complain in America, but we can gripe and complain. In some places, you can’t do that,” Butler said.

Framed flags, some nearly as old as the country, were displayed in front of the portable stage where a half-dozen young girls from the Mary Drew School of Dance entertained the crowd. The Penobscot Wind ensemble was on hand to play instrumental classics such as “You’re a Grand Old Flag.” Jeff’s Catering of Brewer provided three canopies to shield attendees from the occasional raindrop.

A lot of Americans aren’t aware that they’re supposed to remove their hats and cover their hearts when a flag passes in front of them, said veteran Ray Lupo, 72, of Hampden. “That’s one of the things the general public takes for granted,” he said.

Lupo called the proposed constitutional amendment to ban flag burning a “good idea” but cautioned, “I don’t know how they’re going to enforce it.”

National Flag Day was established as a holiday by an Act of Congress in 1949 and signed into law by President Harry Truman.

“People need to know the history of the flag and the history of the country,” said Iraq War veteran Specialist Jason Bones, 20, of Bangor.

“Privileged” is how Alton Grant of Clifton said he felt to be present at the ceremony. “There’s not too many people my age, those who were in World War II, that are still around,” he said.