There is a very nice display of historical US flags, with a particular emphasis on the arrangement of the stars over time, in the San Francisco airport international terminal, or at least there was, as recently as 4 weeks ago. I wanted to take pictures of it but forgot my digital camera. I got the impression from the display that for a large fraction of US history, the arrangement of stars has been left to the flag maker. There were flags with circular symmetry, for example, involving 23-29 stars or so I think. I also remember that all the flags were from one person's collection in San Francisco, or somewhere nearby. I've thought the 46 star flag shown at the URL below must not be the best possible. http://www.law.ou.edu/hist/flags/fedflag.shtml Thane Plambeck 650 321 4884 office 650 323 4928 fax http://www.qxmail.com/ehome.htm ----- Original Message ----- From: "John Conway" <conway@Math.Princeton.EDU> To: "math-fun" <math-fun@mailman.xmission.com> Sent: Friday, September 05, 2003 7:57 AM Subject: [math-fun] The problem of the 51st state.
This is a problem that's worried me for quite some time : if and when there are 51 United States, then how should the resulting 51 stars be arranged on the "Stars and Stripes" flag?
There are nice arrangements for 48, 49, 50 stars:
* * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * *
* * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * *
* * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * ,
but although I've considered this problem many times, I never came up with any arrangement I considered even remotely satisfactory before last night.
Since I'd like to hear other people's ideas, I won't post last night's discovery until some of you have had a go at the problem, although I can hardly think any of you will come up with a pattern as good as mine!
It would also be interesting to know whose job it is do settle such things, whether some 51-star design has already been provisionally decided upon, and of course, whether that's as good as mine.
Regards, John Conway
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