POW/MIA Flags
What the POW/MIA Flag Represents
It is the unspoken promise to the families of loved ones who remain behind, they are Not Forgotten. It is a symbol to remind everyone of the sacrifice that prisoners of war and those missing in action have endured while fighting for our country.
It serves as a reminder of those who were held in enemy captivity as well as the more than 1800 Americans who are still unaccounted for. Beyond Southeast Asia, it has been a symbol for POW/MIAs from all U.S. wars.
Conception and Design
The black POW/MIA flag was developed by the National League of POW/MIA Families. In 1971, Mrs. Michael Hoff of Jacksonville, Florida, wife of MIA Michael Hoff, a Navy Pilot, had the idea that the National League of Families of POW/MIA should have a banner, or flag, to represent its important cause. The flag was the creation of the National League of Families of Prisoners of War, later the National League of Families of American Prisoners and Missing in Southeast Asia, a fascinating part of the story in itself.
The organization was founded by POW wife Sybil Stockdale, during the Johnson administration, in an effort to embarrass LBJ and challenge his line that all in Vietnam was going swell.
Newt Heisley was responsible for the deisgn of the current POW/MIA flag. Heisley was a veteran of the South Pacific Theater of World War II who worked as a professional art director at Annin and Company. The POW/MIA flag is black, bearing in the center, in black and white, the emblem of the League. It features a solemn figure on a field of black watched over by a distant tower and a barbed wire fence, with the message, “You are not forgotten.” The silhouette on the flag was modeled after Heisley's 24-year-old son, who was on leave from the Marines and looking gaunt while getting over hepatitis.
An Important American Symbol
On August 10, 1990, the 101st Congress passed U.S. Public Law 101-355, recognizing the National League of Families POW/MIA flag and designating it “a symbol of our Nation’s concern and commitment to restoring and resolving as fully as possible the fates of Americans still prisoner, missing and unaccounted for in Southeast Asia", thus ending the uncertainty for their families and the Nation. Civilians are free to fly the POW/MIA flag whenever they wish. Unlike the flag of the United States, it is not a symbol of our nation and therefore the POW/MIA flag is not to be saluted. When displayed from a single flagpole, the POW/MIA flag should fly directly below, and be no larger than, the United States flag (Civilian or on congressional-designated days).
The first National POW/MIA Recognition Day was proclaimed in 1979. POW/MIA Recognition Day is commemorated on the third Friday of every September, a date that's not associated with any particular war.
It has become to mean much more now than it did when it was developed. Theirs is a debt we can never fully repay, though we will continue striving to remain worthy of their sacrifice. We fly the POW/MIA flag to remember, respect and honor them.
