My father's flag spent fourteen years in a dresser drawer. Folded, in the plastic sleeve it came home in, behind the winter sweaters. I am not a veteran. I am the civilian in the family, the one who shops and drives and makes the coffee, and for most of those fourteen years I did not think there was anything wrong with a drawer. Then Walt Nowak died in mid January at eighty-one, and a few days later I stood in his kitchen and saw Marge's flag still in its sleeve on her table.
That week I went home, took Earl's flag out of the drawer, and ordered two Americanflat 5x9.5 Folded Flag Display Cases. One for my mantel. One for Marge, delivered in March by me and my brother Ray. Both have been sitting out in the open for about eight months now. Here is what a case actually does, in plain terms, without the sales language.
The case I bought twice, once for my father's flag and once for a widow's
Engineered wood frame, plexiglass front, triangular, 13.2 inches high and 26.4 inches wide. Sized for a 5x9.5 foot burial flag. Sits on a mantel, shelf or tabletop, or hangs with the hardware in the box.
Amazon Check Today's Price on Amazon →It takes the flag out of the drawer and puts it where the family walks past it
A drawer is storage. A mantel is a place. My father's flag sat in the dark from 2009 until this March, and nobody in the family saw it. Now it sits above the brick fireplace in my living room and I look at it every single morning on the way to the kitchen. The flag did not change. The location did, and the location is the whole thing. Marge's sits on her bookcase, and she has told me twice that she likes seeing it while she watches television. That is the entire benefit. It is not small.
It gives a folded flag an actual shape instead of a lump in a bag
A burial flag folded properly is a triangle, and in a plastic sleeve it just looks like laundry. The Americanflat case is triangular to match, 13.2 inches high and 26.4 inches wide, so the fold reads as a fold instead of a bundle. Marge made a small sound when I set it on her bookcase, and she is not a woman who makes sounds. The shape does the work. The flag was already folded right. The case just stopped hiding it.
It keeps hands, dust and sunlight off wool that cannot be replaced
You cannot go buy another one of these flags. That is the fact that drove the purchase for me. Wool holds dust, and hands leave oil, and a flag sitting open on a shelf gets both. The plexiglass front on this case covers the flag completely. I wipe the front with a soft cloth and the flag itself never gets touched. That is not a dramatic claim about preservation. It is just one less thing landing on something you cannot replace.
Getting the flag in took about ten minutes at the kitchen table
I want to be honest here, because I expected a fight. I sat down at the kitchen table with my father's flag and the case, and ten minutes later I was done. You unfold the sleeve situation, you set the folded flag into the triangle, and you close it up. No tools for the tabletop setup. I had put this off for years because I assumed I would ruin it. Ten minutes. That is the whole obstacle I had built up in my head.
It works on a mantel, a shelf, or a tabletop, so it fits the room you actually have
Not everybody has a wall worth drilling into. My father's flag is on the mantel, not hung. Marge's is on a bookcase shelf. The Americanflat case does both, tabletop or wall, and the wall hardware comes in the box. At 3.3 inches deep it does not crowd a shelf. The one thing to check before you buy is width, because 26.4 inches is a real footprint. Marge had to move a lamp and a picture frame to make room. She did not mind. But I would measure the shelf first.
My father's flag sat in a drawer from 2009 until this March. Ten minutes at the kitchen table was the entire obstacle.
It gives you something to hand down instead of something to explain
Right now, when I am gone, my daughter Karen inherits a flag in a case. That is a different object than a flag in a bag. She will not have to wonder what it is or where it came from, because it will be sitting on the mantel above the fireplace, the way it has been since March. A case is not for the veteran, in a lot of these situations. The veteran is gone. It is for the person who has to carry the thing forward, and it makes their job easier.
It is a gift for a widow that does not require a speech
Ray and I drove to Marge's together in March. I handed her the case and told her it was for Walt's flag, and that was it. No speech, no ceremony. She put it on the bookcase herself while we stood there, and Ray told her it looked right. That is the entire event. Some gifts need explaining. This one did not, and I think that is because everybody in the room already understood what a flag is and what it means. The object did the talking.
It says the family noticed, without anybody having to say it
My father died in 2009. His flag went in a drawer because we were busy and grieving and nobody wanted to make a decision. That drawer was not disrespect. It was just life. But putting the flag out in the open eight months ago was the first time anybody in this family did anything deliberate with it since the funeral. Ray noticed. He stood in my living room and did not say much, and then he said the drawer had bothered him for years and he never brought it up. The case said it for both of us.
The black engineered wood frame fits a living room instead of fighting it
I am not a decorator and I do not want to be. The frame is engineered wood in black, and it sits on a wood mantel above a brick fireplace without drawing attention to itself. It does not look like a shrine and it does not look like a trophy. That matters to a man like my brother, who would rather not have a fuss made. It reads as furniture. A flag inside it reads as something worth keeping.
It costs less than the alternatives, and it is the one I actually bought twice
I looked at solid wood flag cases when I was shopping. There is a real one in the hall at the post, oak, and it is a fine piece of work. I did not buy one. I bought two of these Americanflat cases instead, and eight months in nothing has broken, nothing has loosened, and both flags are still clean and dry. If you want oak, buy oak. But if you want the flag out of the drawer this month instead of someday, this is the version that gets it done.
What I'd Skip
If the flag is a full-size flag that was never folded into a triangle, skip this and get a flat frame instead. This case is built for a 5x9.5 foot burial flag folded the way the honor guard folds it. If it is not folded, it will not sit right, and no amount of arranging will fix that.
Also skip it if you have no shelf, mantel or tabletop wide enough for 26.4 inches and no wall you are willing to drill. And be honest with yourself about the material. This Americanflat case is engineered wood with a plexiglass front, not solid oak with glass. It is a good, solid object that has sat on my mantel for eight months without complaint, but it is not an heirloom cabinet, and I would rather you hear that from me than find out when the box arrives.
One more thing worth knowing. Plexiglass shows fingerprints and dust, and it scratches if you wipe it with a rough cloth. Use something soft. And keep the whole thing out of direct sun, which is true of any flag whether it is in a case or not.
The flag is already folded. It is the drawer that is the problem.
Black engineered wood, triangular, plexiglass front. 13.2 inches high, 26.4 inches wide, 3.3 inches deep. Tabletop, mantel, shelf, or wall with the included hardware.
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