Fort Smith Flagpole

In the center of this circle [the parade ground] stood a tall flag-staff, from which dizzy height, ‘Old Glory,’ flung its protecting folds to the breeze. Morning and evening to the salute of a cannon and the strains of martial music, the flag was raised and lowered.”

Mary Rutherford Cravens

The U.S. Army built the original flagstaff at the second Fort Smith in 1846. As with many western military posts, the flagstaff stood tall so that its flag could be seen for miles. To attain a height of nearly 100 feet, the army joined two poles in the same way that ship masts were built. Shroud lines attached to cross trees supported the area where the poles were joined, while guidelines and an underground wooden structure stabilized the base.

When the army closed Fort Smith in 1871, they removed the flagstaff. The “Old Fort Militia,” a local citizens’ support group, in cooperation with the National Park Service rebuilt the flagstaff in 1984-85. That flagstaff was replaced in 2021.

The 37-star flag is a replica of the one flying over the fort when it closed in 1871.