And three decades after a former Army pilot first sketched the stark image to commemorate those missing in action from America's longest war, it has become an enduring emblem of Vietnam, a flag second in popularity only to Old Glory itself. It has grown beyond the wildest hopes of its creators to become a quiet yet persistent reminder that not all the wounds of Vietnam have healed. Maryland is contemplating similar bills to fly the flag atop the State House dome and at highway rest areas. Never before, they say, have sovereign states and nations required that the flag of a political movement regularly be flown alongside their own. In part because of that official embrace, the flag born to urge the speedy return of captured U.S. servicemen continues to grow in power and popularity.
Dealers say it is their second-biggest seller after the Stars and Stripes.
They want to know what happened to them. The flag grew from Vietnam, but to veterans organizations it has come to represent all the missing from U.S. military actions dating back to World War II, a group totaling 88,000. Mass. He remembers when the flag appeared in the 1970s. I never imagined how it would grow. Sharing his surprise is the flag's creator, a former World War II Army Air Forces pilot named Newton Heisley, now 80.