rawn by Washington. From other traditional resources
it was also claimed, that Mrs. Ross changed the stars from six-pointed
to five-pointed. The whole claim is based upon tales told from memory
by relatives, no other proofs have ever been found, and a careful and
thorough research fails to discover any. In 1878 a pamphlet was
issued from the printing office of the State printer at Harrisburg,
Pennsylvania, written by a Mr. Reigart, based upon the above claim, and
calling Mrs. Ross "the immortal heroine that originated the first flag
of the Union." The book had an alleged portrait of Betsy Ross making
the first flag; but it was afterwards discovered that it was really the
portrait of an old Quaker lady who was living in Lancaster at the time
the book was written. The book was so unreliable that it made the Ross
claim appear ridiculous in the eyes of the public.

If Mrs. Ross made a flag in an Arch street house, as claimed, it was
made after a design that had been conceived and born somewhere else, and
her contribution was no more than her labor in sewing on some stars, the
same labor that is given by any girl or woman who works in a flag
manufactory. Even according to the paper which was read before the
Society in 1870 it is admitted that a design made by someone else was
taken to her, but that she made certain changes in it. Now, that is all
there is in the Betsy Ross claim; yet the growing youths of the nation
are being misled and taught an historical untruth when it is asserted
that Mrs. Ross designed, originated and made the first American flag,
and a lithograph has been issued showing that historical untruth, which
has not as good a foundation, in fact, as the two paintings to which I
have referred, because the events sought to be depicted in those two
cases did happen. All the sentiment exhibited over the Betsy Ross story
is lost upon those who have looked the matter up, and are conversant
with the history and growth of our national emblem, which I will now
take up. Those seeking for more elaborate details are referred to
Bancroft's History of the United States; Lossing's Field Book of the
Revolution; Philadelphia Times, April 6, 1877; The American, The
Colonial and the Pennsylvania Archives; Journals of Congress, Vols. 1
and 2; Preble's History of the Flag; Cooper's Naval History; Life of
John Adams; Hamilton and Sarmiento's Histories of our Flag; Sparks'
and Washington Irving's Lives of Washington; Washington's ow