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Did you know that, according to a Harris Poll, two out of three Americans don’t know the words to our national anthem?
The 2006 National Anthem Project Road Shop will visit Columbia next week as part of its 50-state tour to re-teach Americans the historical relevance and words of the national anthem, while spotlighting the importance of school music.
“The Star-Spangled Banner” was originally a poem written by Washington attorney Francis Scott Key during the War of 1812.
On the night of Sept. 13, 1814, Key watched as the British Navy attacked Fort McHenry. As dawn broke, Key expected to see the fort taken, but instead saw that the American flag — tattered and torn — still flew over the fort.
The poem he began on the back of a letter was later set to a tune attributed to John Stafford Smith. It became the national anthem in 1931.
Monday’s activities will take place between 11 a.m. and 4 p.m. at the EdVenture Museum, 211 Gervais St.
Tuesday’s activities will take place between 9 a.m. and 1 p.m. on the north steps and grounds of the Statehouse at Main and Gervais streets.
Kids and adults alike will have the chance to prove their singing skills and patriotic spirit in the National Anthem Project All-Star Contest.
The winner will have $1,000 donated to their local music program and get the opportunity to perform at a concert in Washington in 2007.
There will also be concerts by school choirs and interactive, educational activities that teach about the historical significance of the national anthem.
On the Web: www.thenationalanthemproject.org.
The Star Spangled Banner
Words by Francis Scott Key, music by John Stafford Smith
O say, can you see, by the dawn’s early light,
What so proudly we hailed at the
twilight’s last gleaming?
Whose broad stripes and bright stars, through the perilous fight,
O’er the ramparts we watched,
were so gallantly streaming?
And the rocket’s red glare,
the bombs bursting in air,
Gave proof through the night
that our flag was still there.
O say does that star spangled banner yet wave
O’er the land of the free,
and the home of the brave?
On the shore dimly seen
through the mists of the deep.
Where the foe’s haughty
host in dread silence reposes,
What is that which the breeze,
o’er the towering steep,
As it fitfully blows, half conceals, half discloses?
Now it catches the gleam
of the morning’s first beam,
In full glory reflected now shines in the stream:
’Tis the Star-Spangled Banner!
O long may it wave
O’er the land of the free
and the home of the brave.
And where is that band
who so vauntingly swore
That the havoc of war
and the battle’s confusion
A home and a country
should leave us no more?
Their blood has washed
out their foul footsteps’ pollution.
No refuge could save the hireling and slave
From the terror of flight,
or the gloom of the grave:
And the Star-Spangled Banner,
in triumph doth wave
O’er the land of the free
and the home of the brave.
O thus be it ever when freemen shall stand
Between their loved homes
and the war’s desolation!
Blest with vict’ry and peace,
may the Heaven-rescued land
Praise the Power that hath
made and preserved us a nation.
Then conquer we must when
our cause it is just
And this be our motto: “In God is our Trust.”
And the Star-Spangled Banner
in triumph shall wave
O’er the land of the free
and the home of the brave!