Marie Elizabeth Watkins Oliver

Marie Elizabeth Watkins Oliver (January 11, 1854 - October 18,1944) was the designer and creator of the Missouri State Flag.[1]

Early Life

Marie Elizabeth Watkins was born in Ray County, Missouri to Charles Allen Watkins and Henrietta Rives Watkins. The family lived in a country home called Westover, and were fairly well off due to her father's work as both a farmer and businessman.[1] Her father developed a number of businesses with her uncle, James R. Allen, including a brickyard, flour mill, sawmill, store, and warehouse.[1] Marie was educated by a governess and at private schools, before attending Richmond College with her younger brothers.

Marie Watkins became the tutor for her brothers as they prepared to attend the University of Missouri.[1] One of her brothers, Charles, roomed with a law student, Robert Burett Oliver, who would eventually become her husband. When Charles died, Robert began exchanging letters with Marie. They wrote for two years before eventually meeting in 1876. After a long courtship, the two were married on December 10, 1879.[1] The two moved to Jackson, Missouri, where Robert worked as a lawyer until he was elected to the Missouri Senate in 1882. Marie Elizabeth Watkins Oliver had five sons and one daughter while living in Jackson: Robert Burett Jr., John Byrd, Allen Laws, William Palmer, Charles Watkins, and Marie Marguerite.[2] During that time, Marie began volunteering throughout the community.

Designing Missouri's Flag

In 1896, Marie Elizabeth Watkins Oliver moved with her family to Cape Girardeau, Missouri, where her husband established his law firm. In 1904, Oliver joined the Nancy Hunter Chapter of the Daughters of the American Revolution (DAR), and in 1907 she was elected state DAR vice regent.[2] In 1908, the state DAR noticed that Missouri did not have an official state flag, and Mrs. Samuel McKnight Green appointed a committee to research, design, and secure passage of a bill for an official flag.[2]

Oliver was appointed chairperson of the committee, and began writing to the secretaries of state for every state and territory in the Union, in order to learn how other locations designed their flags, and the process necessary to have them adopted. She received an answer from every Secretary of State, and spent months researching historical interests connected to passing legislation about state flags.[3] She envisioned a flag that featured the Missouri coat of arms, encircled by twenty four stars that represented Missouri's status as the twenty-fourth state to enter the Union.[2] Marie's friend and artist, Mary Kochtitzky, painted Marie's design, and her husband, now a former state senator, drafted the legislative bill.

On March 17, 1909, Marie and Robert's nephew, Senator Arthur L. Oliver, introduced the bill to the Missouri Senate. The bill passed twenty four to one, but failed to pass in the House of Representatives.[2] The bill was reintroduced in 1911, but met with the same result since the General Assembly was considering another design known as the "Holcomb flag." Oliver thought that the "Holcomb flag" did not distinctively represent Missouri, since the stripes might be confused with the National flag, and failed to include any representation of local government.[4] Later that year, the Missouri State Capitol burned, destroying Kochtitzky's original work. Oliver and another friend, Mrs. S. D. MacFarland, recreated the design in silk.[4] On January 21, 1913, the Oliver Flag Bill was again reintroduced, this time passing on March 7 and being officially signed by Governor Elliott Woolfolk Major on March 22, 1913.[2]

Marie Elizabeth Watkins Oliver kept the silk flag until her death in 1944,[4] when she was buried in Lorimer Cemetery in Cape Girardeau.[1] In 1961, her son Allen gave the flag to the State of Missouri, where it was put on display until it began to deteriorate. In 1988, elementary students raised enough money to restore the flag in honor of it's 75 anniversary,[1] and it is currently displayed in the James C. Kirkpatrick State Information Center in Jefferson City, Missouri.

Public Statement Defending the Flag

While her flag's design was being considered in comparison to the "Holcomb flag," Marie Elizabeth Watkins Oliver wrote an official statement detailing the meaning and interpretation of her design.

"The Constitution of the state provides that the emblems and devices of the Great Seal of the State as heretofore prescribed by law, shall not be subject to change. The coat-of-arms is a part of the great seal of the state and unquestionably should be made a prominent feature of a state flag. The Doctor Holcomb design for a state flag introduced in the House is objectionable in that it does not contain the coat-of-arms, and because the general design is similar to the national flag. It is liable to cause a confusion in the field and elsewhere. There is nothing in the Holcomb design that indicates state sovereignty or the relation of the state to the Union, except the abbreviation of Missouri by the use of the letters "Mo."

The design I offer embraces all the colors of the national flag—red, white and blue—which recognizes that the State of Missouri is a part and parcel of the Federal Government. At the same time it represents the state as possessing a local independence, a local self-government, but in perfect harmony with the great national compact, as shown by the mingling of the colors, red, white and blue, on every side of it.

The coat-of-arms of the state is in the center of the national colors and represents Missouri as she is—the geographical center of the nation. The twenty-four (24) stars on the blue band encircling the coat-of-arms signifies that Missouri was the twenty-fourth state admitted into the Union of States. The blue in the flag signifies vigilance, permanency and justice; the red, valor; and the white, purity.

The crescent on the shield, in heraldry, represents the second son, so our crescent on this shield denotes that Missouri was the second state (Louisiana being the first) formed of the territory of the great Louisiana Purchase. The helmet of the coat-of-arms indicates enterprise, and hardihood and signifies state sovereignty.

The great grizzly bears are peculiarly appropriate to a state traversed by the Missouri River, and in our coat-of-arms and on this flag these bears signify the size of the state, the strength of the state and the courage of her people, and further, they represent protection to the state from invasion from every source.

This design for a state flag represents that while we, as a state are independent and support ourselves as a state, we are also in perfect harmony with and constitute an important part in the support and maintenance of the National Government. The motto shows that the will of the people is the supreme law of the state. This flag, therefore, stands for something."[3]

References

  1. 1 2 3 4 5 6 7 The State Historical Society of Missouri. "Marie Watkins Oliver". The State Historical Society of Missourians: Historic MIssourians. The State Historical Society of Missouri. Retrieved December 1, 2016.
  2. 1 2 3 4 5 6 Christensen, Lawrence O. (1999). Dictionary of Missouri Biography. Columbia, MO: University of Missouri Press. p. 584.
  3. 1 2 Oliver, Robert Burett (April 1919). "History of the State Flag of Missouri". Missouri Historical Review. 13, 3: 226–231.
  4. 1 2 3 Oliver, Allen L. (October 1957). "The Missouri State Flag". Missouri Historical Review. 52, 1: 35–39.
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