Flag of Lubec

   Sixth grade students Seth Doherty, Emma Page, Austin Serrato, Robert Wallace and Stephanie Wright met to plan for Lubec's Bicentennial Celebration. Emma queries, "Does Lubec have a flag?" All become excited. Stephanie asks, "Where can we find a seamstress?" Others planned fund-raising to pay costs.
   Students organized fundraisers . Julia Smith joined. Students mounted a  Fifth-Eight Grade Dance doing promotion, decorating, playing music, and quietly completing cleanup on their own.
    Julie Keene volunteered to sew the original flag. Funds also paid for a commercially-printed nylon flag for outdoor use. Lubec's Board of Selectmen designated the flag as the official Bicentennial flag.

Unveiling the flag at Lubec's 200th Birthday Party on June 21, 2011, Seth Doherty holds the outside nylon flag while Robert Wallace and Emma Page exhibit the original sewn flag made by Julie Keene.

The July 3rd parade was led by the Stars and Stripes, then the Lubec flag, carried alternately by Seth Doherty (far right in green) and Robert Wallace (next to him in Scout uniform). Behind were Kevin Raye, President of th Maine State Senate, and David C. Burns, Maine State Representative for the Lubec region.

U.S. Senator Susan Collins , keynote speaker in Lubec on July 4. Before her address she asked to talk with "the girl who designed the flag," then later called Emma Page, now ready for the 8th grade, up to the podium.

Lubec citizens voted this the official Lubec flag on August 2, 2011. No precedent seems to exist anywhere for a municipal flag designed by a student.

Members of the American Legion Stewart Green Post 65 Color Guard exhibit the flag prior to raising it at Monument Lot, the site exactly 100 years to the hour earlier of Lubec's 1911 Centennial celebration.

A "Legislative Sentiment," official recognition of unusual and meritorious accomplishment, was presented to Emma Page in the Maine Senate Chamber on January 19th, 2012. Naming the other now eighth graders who participated significantly in the project, the students (along with the entire seventh grade) were guests of State Senate President Kevin Raye and State Representative David C. Burns. Representative Burns read the document in session of the House of Representatives, then presented it in the Senate Chamber.

Left to right, Senate President Kevin Raye reading Legislative Sentiment, Robert Wallace (partially obscured), Seth Doherty, Julia Smith, Stephanie Wright, Emma Page, Maine State Representative David C. Burns. Behind Rep. Burns is Jackson Bizer, recent addition to eighth grade.

Accompanying the 24 7th and 8th grade students on the long trip to Augusta were teachers Mrs. Lori McLean and Mrs. Terry Murphy. The bus driver was Mr. Clarence Street. Principal Ms. Tina Wormell also travelled to the State House, as did Emma Page's parents, Ken and Stephanie Page.

WABI-TV, Channel 5 in Bangor, covered the event. Below reporter Rob Poindextor interviews Emma Page and Seth Doherty.