This post complements Chapter 24. Elegance Doesn’t Come Easy: The South Carolina State Flag in my book, The Palmetto Book: Histories and Mysteries of the Cabbage Palm, published by the University of Florida Press.
It’s been compared to a toilet brush and “a bouquet of blown-out umbrella skeletons.” What is it? The central element in a proposed redesign of the South Carolina state flag.
Proposed new flag design
In a textbook case of groupthink, five well-meaning white men proposed a new State Flag design that features a raggety cabbage palm design based, admittedly, on a mere sketch from over a century ago. The five had been charged by the South Carolina legislature with proposing an official state flag design that would be used in government contexts, which was an effort to replace various flag designs now in use with one agreed-upon design.
Continue reading “The Committee and the Toilet Brush”