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Maker of the Star Spangled Banner Flag

Mary Pickersgill (born Mary Young; February 12, 1776 – October 4, 1857) was the maker of the Star-Spangled Banner hoisted over Fort McHenry during the Battle of Baltimore in the War of 1812.

The daughter of another noted flag maker, Rebecca Young, Pickersgill learned her craft from her mother, and in 1813 she was commissioned by Major George Armistead to make a flag for Baltimore's Fort McHenry that was so large that the British would have no difficulty seeing it from a great distance.

The flag was installed in August 1813 and, during the Battle of Baltimore a year later, Francis Scott Key could see the flag while negotiating a prisoner exchange aboard a British vessel and was inspired to pen the words that became the United States National Anthem in 1931.

Pickersgill, widowed at age 29, became successful enough in her flag-making business that in 1820 she was able to buy the house that she had been renting in B