Flag Day in the United States is celebrated on June 14, commemorating the first national flag resolution.
On June 14, 1777, the Second Continental Congress adopted a resolution specifying thirteen alternating red and white stripes and thirteen white stars on a blue field. The stars and stripes represented the thirteen states then forming the new union. The resolution did not prescribe the later familiar arrangement of stars.
Flag Day is not the same holiday as Independence Day. Independence Day falls on July 4 and commemorates the adoption of the Declaration of Independence in 1776. Flag Day instead focuses on the national emblem adopted nearly a year later during the Revolutionary War.
Woodrow Wilson issued a presidential proclamation recognizing Flag Day in 1916. In 1949, Congress officially established National Flag Day through legislation. Pennsylvania became the first state to recognize Flag Day as a state holiday in 1937, although observances had existed earlier in several communities.