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By Marcia Phillips
Davie County Public Library

While we easily recognize our state flag, do we know what the dates on it stand for?
They harken from an era we are celebrating over the next 18 months, the 250th anniversary of the Declaration of Independence and the American Revolution that secured the independence of our nation.
So what does the 250th anniversary of one of the dates on our flag in this month have to do with that?
May 20, 1775 was long recognized and honored for an early declaration of independence, within the then British Colony of North Carolina, that predated by over a year the one drafted in Philadelphia on July 4th, 1776. When the North Carolina state flag was designed (not until 1885, over a century after statehood – they were busy sorting out other matters and then there was a Civil War), it was perceived as one of two most important dates to be on the flag.
The Mecklenburg Declaration, as it is called or less formally the “Meck Dec” to save time, was supposedly drafted in the Charlotte area by local citizens to formally declare they wanted to be independent of British Rule and would have been the earliest such declaration of independence in our nation. The key word in that last sentence is supposedly because no physical copy of the Meck Dec survives and it did not show up in print until 1819 (and that copy sounded suspiciously like Thomas Jefferson’s more famous version). There were oral history accounts but they differed in details.
So while there was no doubt an assembly of heated patriots and lively discussion, we have no proof it was ever declared in writing on a piece of paper. However, a debate over whether the original debate took place then lasted over a century. This is the challenge of history, to survive and be provable by items that survive. The original copy according to legend was destroyed in a house fire, showing how fragile history can be.
There is better evidence on May 31 that year of the Mecklenburg Resolves, a list of resolutions that criticized the colonial government but wished for reconciliation not independence. By the time historians decided this was probably the first such document, the erroneous date was already on the flag (and the state seal and a monument in Charlotte and was even a state holiday for a while) but the only change to the date on the flag was to remove a comma.
The other date on the flag recalls the Halifax Resolves but that is another story for another time.
Meanwhile stop by the History Room at the library to see a shifting commemorative display of this big birthday party for our nation with freebies and information on special programs highlighting how the Revolution played out locally. Join the celebration.