What ‘The Star-Spangled Banner’ was originally titled "He had witnessed Britain’s 25-hour bombardment of the Fort, and for Key, the raising of the American flag was a triumphant symbol of bravery and perseverance," the National Parks Service writes. As a condition of the release, the British ordered the Americans not to return to shore during the attack on Baltimore, according to .Īs a result, Key watched the battle unfold in the pouring rain - and eventually, he was able to determine that the Fort’s storm flag had survived the barrage and that by dawn, the larger revile flag was proudly raised. The Maryland-born attorney had been helping to negotiate the release of an American civilian who was captured in an earlier battle. Ripley, meanwhile, pointed out that Lindy was actually the 67th man to do what he did, so maybe we should all slow our collective rolls.Francis Scott Key penned his poem during a naval attack on Fort McHenry in Baltimore, on the Chesapeake Bay, by British ships during the war of 1812. Lindbergh had just made a nonstop, solo flight across the Atlantic and was being lauded as a hero. But it didn't really hit the big time until 1927 when Ripley did the unthinkable: he called out Charles Lindbergh as a liar. In 1924, it was picked up for syndication by the Associated Press and started gaining even more eyeballs. Originally started as a sports trivia comic, Ripley's Believe It or Not did fine for its first few years. Just how, exactly, did a single-panel comic – one, by the way, that's still running today – change actual American policy? Through persistence, pedantry, and pissing off just about everyone.
Public Domain Back when being outraged took actual time and postage. Despite Francis Scott Key first writing the "The Star-Spangled Banner" in 1814, and despite its patriotic popularity during the Wars Civil and World I, it didn't officially become America's song until 1931 – two years after Robert Ripley's Believe It or Not comic riled up the masses and caused a letter-writing campaign the likes of which the world had never seen.
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