Today we celebrate the National Anthem

There's a holiday for just about everything. Yesterday was "Old Stuff Day," today is "I Want You to be Happy Day" and "If Pets had Thumbs Day." As silly as those are, today is also "National Anthem Day."

Today celebrates no specifically when the song was written, which was September 14th, but the day that it officially became the US's National Anthem, as congress decreed it on March 3rd, 1931. The song was written by Francis Scott Key during the war of 1812 while he was a captive of the British army. As a captive, Key negotiated the release of his friends on board the ship, but was kept as a prisoner of war himself. While still captive on board the ship, Fort McHenry (guarding Baltimore and it's harbor) was attacked.

(At this point, the flag was still the 15 stars, 15 stripes version.)

Key watched the attack from the ship, and when morning came and the American flag was still visible and flying high, he was inspired to write The Star Spangled Banner. Originally a poem, it was put to music - ironically enough the tune was of a popular British drinking song! And so we have our national anthem!

Some additional odd trivia: did you know that the song actually has four stanzas? Only the first is usually sung today, although the last stanza is added on rare, formal occasions. Also, the poem was originally called "Defense of Fort McHenry."

The full song, for those of us who aren't familiar with it, follows.

O! say can you see by the dawn's early light What so proudly we hailed at the twilight's last gleaming? Whose broad stripes and bright stars through the perilous fight, O'er the ramparts we watched were so gallantly streaming? And the rockets' red glare, the bombs bursting in air, Gave proof through the night that our flag was still there. Oh, say does that star-spangled banner yet wave O'er the land of the free and the home of the brave?
On the shore, dimly seen through the mists of the deep,
Where the foe's haughty host in dread silence reposes,
What is that which the breeze, o'er the towering steep,
As it fitfully blows, half conceals, half discloses?
Now it catches the gleam of the morning's first beam,
In full glory reflected now shines in the stream:
'Tis the star-spangled banner! Oh long may it wave
O'er the land of the free and the home of the brave!

And where is that band who so vauntingly swore
That the havoc of war and the battle's confusion,
A home and a country should leave us no more!
Their blood has washed out their foul footsteps' pollution.
No refuge could save the hireling and slave
From the terror of flight, or the gloom of the grave:
And the star-spangled banner in triumph doth wave
O'er the land of the free and the home of the brave!

O! thus be it ever, when freemen shall stand
Between their loved home and the war's desolation!
Blest with victory and peace, may the heav'n rescued land
Praise the Power that hath made and preserved us a nation.
Then conquer we must, when our cause it is just,
And this be our motto: 'In God is our trust.'
And the star-spangled banner in triumph shall wave
O'er the land of the free and the home of the brave!

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Today we celebrate the National Anthem

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