Brave Little State is Vermont Public’s listener-powered journalism podcast. Every episode begins with a question submitted by our audience.
Today, we answer this question from Brian Sewell, of Burlington:
“Other states are undergoing redesigns of their state flags. How much do Vermonters know about our flag? And is it time to update ours too?”
Brian also shared his own proposed flag redesign:
Do you have an idea for a new Vermont flag design? Click here to download a blank template. Print it out and email your completed design to hello@bravelittlestate.org — we’ll post our favorites! And don’t forget to write a few sentences sharing your creative inspiration.
Note: Our show is made for the ear. We highly recommend listening to the audio. We’ve also provided a transcript. Transcripts are generated using a combination of robots and human transcribers, and they may contain errors.
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Mikaela Lefrak: Picture, if you will, the American flag. There it is, waving in the wind. There’s the red and the white stripes, and the blue square with the white stars.
Now picture the flag of Vermont. It’s a bit tougher to conjure, right? If you don’t know what it looks like, do not feel bad, because you have a lot of company. Recently I went to a park in Burlington and I asked some Vermonters what the state flag looks like, and here’s what they said.
(montage)
Parkgoers: There’s probably some kind of bear. I don’t know, some, maybe some kind of bird. Ooh, is it fiddleheads? No … Maybe a maple leaf … Maybe a person on the flag? … Is it Ethan Allen, that guy? No? I don’t know … I have zero guesses. I have no idea what is on the flag …
Parkgoer: I think there’s a bee.
Mikaela Lefrak: A bee?
Parkgoer: Yeah.
Mikaela Lefrak: OK.
Parkgoer: Maybe a bear? I don’t know. (laughter) What’s on there — OK, I think there’s a flower on there.
Mikaela Lefrak: I hate to, you’re 0 for three so far.
Parkgoer: Really? Oh my God, what am I picturing?
Mikaela Lefrak: It sounds lovely, whatever you’re describing. How long have you lived here?
Parkgoer: Since 1986. (laughter)
Mikaela Lefrak: These guesses are all completely wrong, but it’s not surprising these Vermonters are confused. For one, the Green Mountain State’s flag is blue. And in the middle is the coat of arms, which is based on the state seal. It has a bunch of teeeny tiny little pictures inside.
Brian Sewell: There's the stag’s head on top. There's the pine tree in the center.
This is Brian Sewell, our question-asker. He knows the Vermont flag pretty well because he works for the state government, so he sees it a lot, like flying outside the statehouse in Montpelier.
Brian Sewell: And then there's a cow and some sheaves of wheat and the mountains, and so it's a whole collection of Vermonty things.
Mikaela Lefrak: And there’s a, I’m genuinely asking I’m not pretending to not know, is there a slogan on it? Freedom and unity?
Brian Sewell: Yeah, there you go. Yes.
Mikaela Lefrak: By the way — Brian and I are actually friends. I’ve been to his house in Burlington a number of times, and the guy really likes flags. He does this thing where he flies two flags on his flag pole instead of just one. Recently when I was there he was flying the flag for the University of Vermont, his alma mater, and a red flag with a pine tree on it — the unofficial flag of New England.
Brian Sewell: Full disclosure, I did grow up in Lexington, Massachusetts. I think growing up in Lexington, it's hard not to catch a little bit of history fever. And so I wanted to have those out.
Mikaela Lefrak: Note that Brian is not flying the Vermont flag. He's not its biggest fan.
Brian Sewell: I feel like Vermont deserves something that stands out a little bit more.
Mikaela Lefrak: Brian is one of many people over the years who's submitted a question to BLS about the Vermont state flag. One person wants to know why Vermont has such a “terrible flag.” Another asked why Vermonters aren’t brave enough — again, their words — to get a new state flag, one that’s more unique. And oh, by the way, what is up with the Green Mountain Boys flag? Could it replace the one we have now? A couple of you have written to us about that.
I love all these questions, because I too have a pet interest in flag design. I think it’s because my birthday is on the Fourth of July, so every birthday cake I had as a kid was decorated like an American flag.
Anyway, here is Brian’s question.
Brian Sewell: Other states are undergoing redesigns of their state flags. How much do Vermonters know about our flag? And is it time to update ours too?
The history of Vermont’s kinda nice, kinda boring state flag
Mikaela Lefrak: After talking to many locals over the past few months about the state flag, I think we can just go ahead and answer Brian’s first question right now. How much do Vermonters know about our flag? On average, not a whole heck of a lot. I mean, my job is to report on this state, and here’s what my own daughter thinks is on the flag.
Mara Lefrak: It has giraffes on it, and one tiny deer, and some, and some ants—
Mikaela Lefrak: Ants?
Mara Lefrak: And some mice, and a tree, and the ocean and someone swimming.
Mikaela Lefrak: Yikes. Brian’s second question, though, is a bit tougher to nail down. Is it time to update our flag?
A couple other states have updated their flags in the past few years. Mississippi removed a Confederate symbol from its flag in 2020 and replaced it with a magnolia flower. In 2024, Utah took off the state seal and put in a beehive. Minnesota adopted a new flag too — a simple white star on a two-tone blue background.
Brian, has watched all these other states change their flags. And he’s wondering if it's Vermont’s turn.
Before I make that call, I want to learn more about this flag of ours. So I head to the Vermont Historical Society in Barre. Their press guy, Andrew Liptak, meets me at the door, flag in hand.
Andrew Liptak: This is the current Vermont flag. In 2023 it turned 100 years old. So we did a little bit of research into the flag at the time. The cows always look a little bit different depending on which ones you buy.
Mikaela Lefrak: Yeah. It does not look like a cow up close.
Andrew Liptak: Yeah, not really. It’s like a weird capybara.
Mikaela Lefrak: Andrew tells me, the blue flag with the coat of arms that we have today is Vermont’s third official state flag. The first one was pretty basic. Picture an American flag, but with 17 stars instead of today’s 50. And across the top of the flag, it read, in big bold letters…
Andrew Liptak: …Vermont. That was the first, the first Vermont flag.
Mikaela Lefrak: Very literal.
Andrew Liptak: Yeah…
Mikaela Lefrak: The second flag debuted in 1837. At this point, the Historical Society’s director, Steve Perkins, joins Andrew and me.
Steve Perkins: Hello…
Mikaela Lefrak: Steve carefully brings out a silk version of this second flag.
Steve Perkins: And you can see the silk is all shattered, but they’ve, it's painted.
Mikaela Lefrak: Painted on silk, wow.
Steve Perkins: Painted…
Mikaela Lefrak: This one still looks like an American flag, but in the blue corner, there’s just one big star. Inside the star is a picture based on the state seal. Vermont founding father Ira Allen designed said seal during the Revolutionary War.
That second flag stuck around for a while. Then, in 1923, the legislature voted to change it again. Flag number three is all blue with the Vermont coat of arms right in the middle – this is the version we know today. I ask Andrew why the change happened, and he says no one really knows.
Andrew Liptak: When I was looking through newspaper reports, there was not really any discussion in columns or letters to the editor or what have you. So it just, basically, they said, We're going to adopt it. They went and adopted it, and it’s been around ever since.
So here we are, with a kinda nice, kinda boring state flag.
A grassroots flag campaign in Maine
About half of the 50 states have flags just like Vermont’s. They’re known as seal-on-a-bedsheet flags, or S-O-Bs. That’s the term used by flag experts like Dave Martucci.
Dave Martucci: Well, I'm a vexillologist, as we like to call ourselves, one who studies flags and banners.
Mikaela Lefrak: Dave lives in mid-coast Maine. He’s an expert on New England flags, and he’s the former president of the North American Vexillological Association. And yes, I did practice saying that word a lot.
Dave Martucci: My primary interest in the subject is, why do people feel compelled to fly flags? That's the bottom line question in my mind all the time.
Mikaela Lefrak: Dave, do you have a favorite state flag?
Dave Martucci: No. I like ‘em all. (laughter)
Mikaela Lefrak: Dave really just wants people to fly flags and think about their history. That’s why he got involved in a recent effort to ditch Maine’s S-O-B — it isn’t popular with flag fans like Dave. They suggested reverting to a version of the previous state flag. Picture a beige flag with a green pine tree in the center and one blue star in the upper left. It flew for just a handful of years in the early 1900s. Still, it’s simple, symbolic, and really popular.
Dave Martucci: You look around in Maine and you'll see the flag with the pine tree and star much more often than you'll see the state flag.
Mikaela Lefrak: So, Dave joined this grassroots movement to restore this 1901 flag. He was pretty excited.
Dave Martucci: I thought the whole campaign was going very well up until the last few weeks.
Mikaela Lefrak: That’s when a counter-narrative started to gain traction. Dave says some people saw the redesign as a quote, unquote, “woke effort” to erase Maine’s history.
Dave Martucci: And that certainly wasn't the case. We're actually, we're trying to restore our history. But we did not get a lot of good, favorable publicity during the last couple of weeks of the campaign on that issue.
Mikaela Lefrak: The state held a referendum on Election Day 2024. Voters rejected the new flag, 55 to 45 percent.
Mikaela Lefrak: Do you think you’ll try again?
Dave Martucci: As I like to say, this is not the end of the road, it's a bend in the road. And so the answer to that is most likely. What that's going to look like, and how and when, I don't know yet, but it's not something that's probably going to happen right away.
Mikaela Lefrak: As for Vermont, if we want to change our flag, Dave has some suggestions for how to go about it. That’s after the break.
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The five key elements to good flag design
Mikaela Lefrak: Dave Martucci’s attempts to change the state flag in Maine point to just how hard it can be to pull off that kind of campaign. If your flag isn’t blatantly offensive, it’s going to be hard to get the general public and state legislators on board with changing it. But it is doable.
So, for any Vermonters who want to take a crack at changing our S-O-B, Dave has some suggestions. For one, start with a blank slate.
Dave Martucci: I mean, that was successful in Utah and Minnesota. Those designs had no bearing on prior history.
Mikaela Lefrak: The North American Vexillological Association actually has a list of five key elements to good flag design:
- Keep it simple, so a child can draw it from memory.
- Use meaningful symbolism.
- Don’t use more than three colors.
- No letters or seals.
- Be distinctive. Don’t duplicate other flags.
Vermont’s current state flag? One for five. We’ve got meaningful symbols at least.
The Green Mountain Boys flag
Mikaela Lefrak: During my reporting, some Vermonters asked if we might ever adopt an arguably more popular flag – the flag of the Green Mountain Boys.
Now if you’re not familiar with it, this flag is green, with a blue square in the top left corner with 13 white stars in it. The flag dates all the way back to the Battle of Bennington in 1777, and it’s now used by the Vermont National Guard. It follows all 5 flag design rules.
But historians and vexillologists warn against it. This blue, white and green flag is a red herring. I’ll let Steve Perkins from the Vermont Historical Society explain.
Steve Perkins: It was flown by General Stark as the flag of the New Hampshire forces.
Mikaela Lefrak: Yep… The flag used by the Vermont National Guard is from…New Hampshire.
Steve Perkins: At some point, as historical stories started to evolve and meld, it was co-opted and called the Green Mountain Boys flag, and then history books and imagery started to show it as the flag being carried by the Green Mountain Boys — who also participated in the Battle of Bennington, but they absolutely did not have this flag. This was a New Hampshire flag. But it is now so tied into the state of Vermont that it's almost impossible to extricate this imagery from the state of Vermont.
Mikaela Lefrak: That is shocking to me.
Mikaela Lefrak: Still is, man. Still is. This is exactly why Dave Martucci says you should always start with a blank slate. Just imagine if Vermont unknowingly adopted a New Hampshire flag. The shame!
Dave also tells me that if you want to change the Vermont flag, the state legislature will need to vote on it. And with everything else going on in the world, it’d take some really good lobbying to convince lawmakers this project is worth their time.
In 2010 a Vermonter in Bradford named Greg Stone started a campaign to update the flag, but other than a few news articles and conversations with his state reps, his effort didn’t go anywhere. In the fifteen years since, there have been changes to the flags of different Vermont cities, like Burlington and Montpelier. Yes, city flags are also a thing. There haven’t been any other significant attempts to change the Vermont state flag.
Imagining a new Vermont flag
But if one crops up in the future, well, I bet our question-asker, Brian Sewell, will have something to do with it. I stopped by his house again recently. This time he was only flying one flag — a combination Pride flag and New England flag. He told me his wife thought flying two flags was a little much. So he went out and bought this, a two-for-one.
Brian Sewell: And I think I had put it up, and, like, a day later, I was mowing the lawn, and a neighbor came by and was like, that's a great flag. That's so cool. Thanks. I was just like, Yes, this is why we do it.
Mikaela Lefrak: I shouldn’t have been surprised to learn that Brian has an idea for a new Vermont state flag. His vision goes like this: On the left side of the flag is a blue vertical bar. It takes up about a third of the flag. The rest is green. And between the two blocks of color stands a gold pine tree — the tree from the state seal.
Brian Sewell: So blue for the lake, green for the Green Mountains, and then a gold pine tree to kind of bring it all together. From what I've seen, that would be pretty unique and set us apart.
Mikaela Lefrak: Ultimately, Brian wants a flag that feels more like… Vermont.
Brian Sewell: We punch above our weight. There are so many things that make Vermont amazing. To have a flag that’s kind of meh, it just didn’t feel like it was living up to what Vermont’s all about. And so I thought, yeah, it’d be really cool if, like, there was an option, or if there were things in the works to design a new state flag, and I think it's worth a shot.
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Credits
This episode was reported by Mikaela Lefrak. Editing and production from the BLS team: Sabine Poux, Burgess Brown and Josh Crane. Our intern is Lucia McCallum. Angela Evancie is our Executive Producer. Theme music by Ty Gibbons; other music by Blue Dot Sessions.
Special thanks to Amanda Gustin, Ted Kaye and Katie Grant.
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