Flags

David L. Ryan/Globe Staff Each flag denoted a Massachusetts soldier lost in the wars of the 20th and 21st centuries. By Jenna Duncan, Globe Correspondent In honor of Memorial Day, nearly 20,000 flags are decorating Boston Common through the weekend to commemorate each Massachusetts soldier lost in conflicts from World War I to today. Organizers and volunteers of the Massachusetts Military Heroes Fund helped plant the flags Tuesday night before a ceremony today that featured remarks from Governor Deval Patrick, Boston Mayor Thomas M. Menino, and Attorney General Martha Coakley.

A bold move late in the Freedom 100 gave Esteban Guerrieri the lead and the Argentine held on to win a crash-marred Indy Lights race Friday in Indianapolis. The developmental series race was largely run in packs and included a wild early melee that brought out a red flag, stopping the race because of damage to a barrier. Another hard hit late in the race brought out a yellow that did not give rookie Carlos Munoz a chance to catch Guerrieri. It's the fourth consecutive year Sam Schmidt Motorsports has won the Freedom 100. France's Tristan Vautier, another rookie, was third behind...

BOURNE — Alexander Arredondo’s son gave his life for a country that his immigrant father now calls his own. Cynthia DesLauriers was driven by a mother’s pride and a desire to remember forever one young man’s service. Jesse Palmieri’s parents, in matching Marine Corps T-shirts, came yesterday to honor their son who serves. And for Paul Monti, yesterday marked the end of a four-year battle for the right to make a small gesture of patriotism — the planting of a flag — at the Bay State’s only national grave site, a practice that had been barred at Massachusetts National...

A flag fund-raiser to support veterans ahead of Memorial Day has drawn an outpouring of support in the small community of Norfolk. The Lions Club is displaying its Field of Flags at Town Hill, where 1,000 American flags have been placed in memory or support of veterans. The club sold the flags for $10 each and has raised more than $12,000 for the Fisher House Boston, a place for military families to stay while their loved ones are receiving treatment at a Veterans Administration medical facility, said Don Hanssen, past president of the Norfolk Lions Club.

The Medfield Historical Society has scheduled a special program today at the Peak House on Main Street. In honor of those who lost their lives on Sept. 11, 2001, the group will display its collection of historical flags on the front lawn. One of the flags flew for 444 days in Baxter Park during the US hostage crisis in Iran, from 1979 to 1981. The house, which dates to the 1600s, will be open for tours starting at 2 p.m. After today, the Peak House will be closed - except by appointment - until Nov. 19, when it opens for one day for the society's annual Pantry Sale.

FOXBOROUGH - Logan Mankins isn't saying every holding penalty he's been called for is a bad one. "I've held a lot and not gotten called, but there's a few I have held and gotten called on it and deserved it," he said yesterday. But there was one in last Sunday's win over the Jets, when he was whistled for grabbing linebacker Bart Scott , that he still disputes. "That was a horrible call," Mankins said. "And I'm not even saying that to be funny, it was just horrible.

A flag fund-raiser to support veterans ahead of Memorial Day has drawn an outpouring of support in the small community of Norfolk. The Lions Club is displaying its Field of Flags at Town Hill, where 1,000 American flags have been placed in memory or support of veterans. The club sold the flags for $10 each and has raised more than $12,000 for the Fisher House Boston, a place for military families to stay while their loved ones are receiving treatment at a Veterans Administration medical facility, said Don Hanssen, past president of the Norfolk Lions Club.

In the early years of the new Republic, new flags were needed, and lots of them. National flags, of course, but also flags for Army regiments and for ships of the fledgling Navy, as well as dozens to be handed out as a gifts to Indian tribes encountered as the new nation pushed westward. Among the prominent flag makers in Philadelphia was the tiny shop headed by Betsy Ross that, in 1810, snagged the contract for six mammoth 18-by-24-foot flags (each measuring 432 square feet) for the garrison at New Orleans.

Veterans groups have bought 1,200 American flags for a major Ohio school district that now requires the Pledge of Allegiance but didn't have enough flags to pledge to. Columbus teachers had improvised with flags printed on pieces of paper or projected onto classroom walls when the new policy was implemented at the start of the school year. Schools are directed to begin each day with the Pledge of Allegiance, though students may choose not to participate. The Columbus Dispatch reports Monday ( http://bit.ly/tWfDXf)

Rhode Island Governor Don Carcieri said flags will fly at half-staff today to commemorate the 1941 Japanese attack on Pearl Harbor. Today is the 69th anniversary of the attack, which drew the United States into World War II. Carcieri said in a statement that it is important to honor veterans and those who died in the attack.

Marine Private Daniel McGuire was born in Middleboro and grew up on the Cape. He played a little bit of lacrosse, and loved theatre. He was the oldest of four boys and was 19 when he was standing at his post in the middle of the night in Fallejuah, Iraq. It was Aug. 14. 2008, a year and a day after he enlisted. His post was attacked and he was fatally shot. "The key is, for us as parents, I don't need you to pay constant tribute to my son, I can do that, but just don't forget him," said Mark McGuire, who Thursday planted a US flag for his son in a flowing display of 33,000 other flags...

The beautiful thing about test dummies, at least for the engineers testing Six Flags New England's newly installed giant roller coaster, is that they don't get sick. No cleanup necessary. The human-like figures, surrounded by sensors and wires, were strapped into seats hanging from reinforced steel girders on a cloudy afternoon earlier this month. The array soaring above them, a complex web of pipes curling and looping from the ground to a height of nearly 200 feet, looked like someone without an instruction manual had tried to assemble an oil rig in a rush.

There's a full slate of events and activities leading up to Memorial Day this year. On Wednesday, students from Plympton Elementary School will place flags at Mt. Feake Cemetery, and Thursday students from the Henry Whittemore Elementary School will do the same at Calvary Cemetery. Then, on Saturday, National Guard veterans and Boy Scouts will place flags at Mt. Feake Cemetery. Next Sunday, the John M. Sullivan Memorial Service will take place at Lincoln and Lake streets at 9 a.m., and at 11 a.m., Our Lady Comforter of the Afflicted Parish at 920 Trapelo Road will host a memorial service for veterans.

May 20 GREEN THUMBS' GATHERING At the Massachusetts Horticultural Society's annual Gardeners' Fair at Elm Bank in Wellesley from 9 a.m. to 3:30 p.m., you can score everything from perennials, trees, shrubs, and herbs to gardening tools and free advice from experts. Also at the fair, White Flower Farm's Great Tomato Celebration, with thousands of plants for sale. 617-933-4900, masshort.org AMERICAN BEAUTIES As many as 150 Cadillacs will decorate the Larz Anderson Auto Museum's lawn area, from 10 a.m. to 3 p.m.; for $10 per adult you can gawk all you...

POSSIBLE TROUBLE AHEAD: Cisco Systems raised fears of a slowdown in technology spending with a sobering forecast that it traced to skittish customers concerned about the fragile state of economy, particularly in Europe. That red flag overshadowed a solid performance in Cisco System Inc.'s most recent quarter. THE PREDICTION: Cisco expects its revenue for the quarter spanning from May through July to rise 2 percent to 5 percent from last year. Analysts had projected a 7 percent gain.

Someone has been stealing solid brass flag holders from veterans graves at a Pittsfield cemetery, and the thefts may have been going on for a while. St. Joseph's Cemetery superintendent Paul Guillou says more than 200 of the flag stands have disappeared. He didn't find out about it until last weekend when police said some of them may have turned up at a scrap metal yard. He said the majority of the stolen flag stands were from the graves of World War I and II veterans, but Korean War and Vietnam War veterans' burial sites were also pilfered.

Gov. John Lynch is ordering New Hampshire flags to be lowered to half-staff to honor Marine Maj. Jeremy Graczyk. The 33-year-old Graczyk of Atkinson died in an accident in Switzerland last week while on leave. His funeral will be held Friday. Burial will be at a later date at Arlington National Cemetery. Graczyk joined the Marine Corps in 1999 after he graduated from the U.S. Naval Academy. He served multiple deployments to Iraq and Afghanistan and had received numerous decorations.

MONTPELIER - Governor Peter Shumlin is ordering flags to be flown at half-staff in honor of a US Navy SEAL who was among 30 military service members killed in an Aug. 6 helicopter crash in Afghanistan. Chief Petty Officer Brian Bill of Virginia Beach, Va., was a graduate of Norwich University in Northfield. He grew up in Stamford, Conn. Shumlin ordered that the flag be lowered at the State House and all federal and state facilities in Vermont, starting sunrise Friday and ending sunset Monday.

Volunteers are needed to replace veterans' flags in the town's cemeteries on May 5. The event will start at 7 a.m., with a free breakfast at the Veterans of Foreign Wars Post 2188 on Station St. Groups will then go to assigned cemeteries and finish up prior to lunch. All local organizations and residents are invited to volunteer for this task. Please call Paul Provencher, local director of veterans' services, at 508-946-2407 to sign up. The rain date is May 19. - Christine Legere