 | |
| The County of San Diego Flag | |
| Use | Civil and state flag |
|---|---|
| Adopted | February 18, 1957 |
| Designed by | Estelle Secor |
The flag of San Diego County was adopted in February 1957, although an actual specimen would not be created until September 1957. It features the San Diego County seal adopted in 1937, centered on a horizontal tricolor of red, white, and green.
In 1956, a committee consisting of John Davidson, County Purchasing Agent Verne Gehringer, and Director of Parks and Recreation Cletus Gardner, conducted a study for a design for an official flag for San Diego County. Gardner wrote in a memo to the Board on February 14, 1957 that "One of the original reasons for this [sic] designing was to have an official County flag hanging in the Board Chambers." [1]
The Board formally adopted a drawing of the flag on February 18, 1957. The County flag was designed by Estelle Secor, a former County employee in the Road Department. Secor presented a completed, hand-sewn flag based on the design to the Board of Supervisors on September 10, 1957. [1]
In 1962, the Board directed that the hand-fabricated official flag of the County by Secor, be thoroughly cleaned and permanently enclosed in a glass case in the Board Chamber. That flag is still on display in the Board Chamber at Room 310 at the County Administration Center, 1600 Pacific Highway in San Diego, California. The U.S. flag, Californian state flag, and County flag are all displayed at most County facilities. [1]
On February 18, 1957, the San Diego County Board of Supervisors adopted an official flag for the county, depicting the county's seal on a field of white, bordered at the top by a band of red, and at the bottom by a band of green, representing how San Diego County was under the control of King Charles of Spain, Mexico, the Republic of California, and the United States. [1]
The colors red, white, and green on the flag symbolize the city's Spanish and Mexican past, as the colors are featured on their respective flags. [2]
The seal depicted on the flag was designed by architect Samuel W. Hamill and was adopted in 1937, replacing a previous seal that had been in use since 1933. It depicts:
a double-headed axe rising from a bundle of sticks, which served as a symbol of authority in ancient Rome. Also included in the seal are the stars and stripes of the United States, a stylized dolphin representing the fruits of the sea, and a horn of plenty representing the fruits of the land. A clipper ship recalls San Diego's historic background of the sea, and the airplane looks into the future. Mt. Palomar Observatory represents a world renowned achievement in science and San Diego's position on the threshold of scientific history. The observatory overlooks an orange grove, which reflects the agricultural riches of the county. Encircling the seal is the motto "The Noblest Motive is the Public Good"--a quotation from Virgil that was chosen by the Building Committee as the motto to adorn the Civic Center Building. At the bottom is the date 1851, which is the date the county was founded. [3]
There was some confusion over the seal. Many citizens:
did not understand what it was meant to represent. One citizen commented "this emblem which is to adorn the Civic Center... represents nothing in the Heavens above, nor the Earth beneath, but is an object of mirth to you men. Still since it is to cost the tax payers 1,000 bucks it is nothing to make merry over." [ W.J. Dougherety. Letter to the Board of Supervisors of San Diego County. February 20, 1938. Records of the Board of Supervisors of San Diego County.] Despite such complaints, the seal was officially adopted by the Board of Supervisors in 1937, replacing an earlier seal that had been chosen in 1933. It adorned the northern entrance to the Civic Center until the city moved out in 1964, when it was also placed over the southern entrance." [4]
The Great Seal of the State of California was adopted at the California state Constitutional Convention of 1849 and has undergone minor design changes since then, the last being the standardization of the seal in 1937. The seal shows Athena in Greek mythology, the goddess of wisdom and war, because she was born an adult, and California was never a territory; a California grizzly bear, the official state animal, feeding on grape vines, representing California's wine production; a sheaf of grain, representing agriculture; a miner, representing the California Gold Rush and the mining industry; and sailing ships, representing the state's economic power. The word Eureka, meaning "I have found it", is the California state motto.
The state flag of the U.S. state of Minnesota consists of a dark blue field representing the night sky and the state's shape, an eight-pointed star representing the North Star, and a bright blue field representing the state's abundant waters; the star is based on one prominently featured in the Minnesota State Capitol rotunda.
The state flag of Vermont displays the state's coat of arms and motto on a rectangular blue background. The Vermont General Assembly adopted the flag on June 1, 1923.
Every sultan of the Ottoman Empire had his own monogram, called the tughra, which served as a royal symbol. A coat of arms in the European heraldic sense was created in the late 19th century. Hampton Court requested from the Ottoman Empire a coat of arms to be included in their collection. As the coat of arms had not been previously used in the Ottoman Empire, it was designed following this request of Mahmud II, and the final design was adopted by Sultan Abdul Hamid II on 17 April 1882.
The Seal of the Commonwealth of Virginia is the official seal of the Commonwealth of Virginia, a U.S. state. The state flag of Virginia consists of the obverse of the seal against a blue background. A state flag was first adopted at the beginning of the American Civil War in April 1861, readopted in 1912, and standardized by the General Assembly in February 1950. The standing allegorical female figure of virtue is shown having vanquished tyranny, symbolized by a fallen king at her feet. She has an exposed breast in the manner of classical depictions of Amazons, making this the only state flag in the U.S. depicting a form of toplessness. The motto Sic semper tyrannis means "Thus always to tyrants." The flag may be decorated with a white fringe along the fly edge; this is usually done when the flag is displayed indoors.
The flag of Indianapolis has a dark blue field with a white five-pointed star pointing upwards in the center. Around the star is a circular field in red. Surrounding the red field is a white ring, from which extend four white stripes from top to bottom and from hoist to fly, thus creating four equal quadrants in the field. The stripes are about one-seventh the width of the flag, with the white ring the same width as the stripes. The diameter of the red circle is about two-ninths the width of the flag.
The Seal of the Commonwealth of Kentucky was adopted in December 1792. Since that time, it has undergone several revisions. The current seal depicts two men, one in buckskin, and the other in more formal dress. The men are facing each other and clasping hands. The outer ring of the seal is adorned with the words "Commonwealth of Kentucky", and within the inner circle is the state motto "United we stand, divided we fall." The official colors of the seal are blue and gold. A version of the seal appears on the flag of Kentucky.
The Great Seal of the State of Illinois is the official emblem of the U.S. state of Illinois, and signifies the official nature of a document produced by the state. The present seal was designed and proposed in 1868 and officially adopted in 1869. It depicts in profile a bald eagle perched on a rock with wings spread and holding a shield, with a banner in its beak and sunrise over water in the background. It replaced an earlier seal that was almost the same as the Great Seal of the United States, adopted when Illinois became a state in 1818.
The seal of the Territory of Idaho was adopted in 1863 and redrawn several times before statehood in 1890. The first state Great Seal was designed in the 1890s by Emma Edwards Green, the only woman to design a U.S. state seal. That seal was used until 1957, when the seal was slightly redrawn by Paul B. Evans and the Caxton Printers, Ltd. at the request of the state government, in order to add more anthropocentric elements to the centered shield.
The Great Seal of the State of Ohio is the official insignia of the U.S. state of Ohio. All governmental offices, agencies, and courts in Ohio use variations of the state seal. Its primary feature is a circular coat of arms that depicts a sunrise in Chillicothe, Ohio's first capital, along with symbols of the state's origins. The seal sometimes appears with the state motto, "With God, All Things Are Possible".
The city flag of Los Angeles consists of a background of three notched stripes of green, gold and red. The flag was designed by Roy E. Silent and E.S. Jones in 1931 for the Los Angeles sesquicentennial from 1781.
The Marin County Civic Center, designed by Frank Lloyd Wright, is located in San Rafael, California, the county seat of Marin County, California, United States. Groundbreaking for the Civic Center Administration Building took place in 1960, after Wright's death and under the watch of Wright's protégé, Aaron Green; it was completed in 1962. The Hall of Justice was begun in 1966 and completed in 1969. Veterans Memorial Auditorium opened in 1971, and the Exhibit Hall opened in 1976.
The first Seal of the County of Los Angeles was established in 1887 and has been changed three times since then. It is used on official county documents, vehicular decals, on buildings, and is displayed on the bear-top shield badge worn by uniformed county officers. It is also featured prominently on the county's flag. The current seal was adopted in 2016 and is identical to a design initially adopted in 2004.
The Flag of the City and County of San Francisco contains a rising phoenix in the center, often assumed to refer to the city's recovery from the 1906 earthquake and subsequent fires. However, the phoenix had been a civic symbol of San Francisco at least since 1852, when it featured on the first official seal of the city. The Board of Supervisors of the City and County of San Francisco codified the design of the current flag on December 16, 1940.
The Betsy Ross flag is an early design for the flag of the United States, which is conformant to the Flag Act of 1777 and has red stripes outermost and stars arranged in a circle. These details elaborate on the 1777 act, passed early in the American Revolutionary War, which specified 13 alternating red and white horizontal stripes and 13 white stars in a blue canton. Its name stems from the story, once widely believed, that shortly after the 1777 act, upholsterer and flag maker Betsy Ross produced a flag of this design.
The Great Seal of the State of Minnesota is the state seal of the U.S. state of Minnesota. It was adopted on May 11, 2024, alongside the state flag, for Statehood Day. It features a common loon, Minnesota's state bird, wild rice, the state grain, and the North Star, representing the state's motto, and is themed around Minnesota's nature. In the inner circle is the phrase Mni Sóta Makoce, the Dakota term for "Land where the water reflects the sky," which is the origin of the state's name.
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The flag of San Diego consists of three vertical bands; colored from left to right; dark red, white and gold. The central white band carries the city seal, which carries the words: "The City of San Diego · State of California · Semper Vigilans." The last of those three phrases is the city's official motto, Latin for "ever vigilant." Under the seal is the number 1542, the year in which Juan Rodríguez Cabrillo first entered San Diego Bay and claimed the area for the Spanish Empire. The red and gold bands come from the colors of Spain's flag. The flag was adopted on October 16, 1934, by the City Council, after Albert V. Mayrhofer submitted a sample banner on behalf of the California Historical Association, the Native Sons of the Golden West, Native Daughters of the Golden West, and The San Diegans.
The seal of Cincinnati is the official insignia of the city of Cincinnati, Ohio, in the United States. Adopted in 1819, the seal incorporates scales, a sword, and a caduceus. The seal is featured prominently in the flag of Cincinnati and the insignia of city agencies and institutions.
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