Dr. Spencer Crew: preserving Star Spangled Banner

Dr. Spencer Crew, director of the Smithsonian's National Museum of American History, joined CNN's Colleen McEdwards on Thursday morning to discuss efforts to preserve the Star Spangled Banner. The flag flew over Fort McHenry and inspired the Francis Scott Key poem that became the national anthem of the United States.

Dr. Spencer Crew says the flag represents the continuation of U.S. independence

McEdwards: So it was flying in 1813, Dr. Crew. I guess the British got a really good look at it as they were retreating. But tell us what you find most fascinating about this flag story. What about its history really inspires you?

Crew: Well, I think the thing that's the most inspiring about the flag is the fact that I think it represents the continuing of the independence of the United States, that when the flag was flying that second day after the battle, it said that we were going to continue to be the United States, an important nation in the world of nations. So that history, I think, and the sense of continuity between the past to the present has been really very important to me.

McEdwards: Can you describe what kind of condition the flag was in before the restoration process got under way?

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Crew: Well, the flag was in fragile condition. We had it available to the public in an open hall, and I think over the years, it began to suffer from dust and other things. And what we did was to take it off the wall and to bring it into this wonderful conservation laboratory, where we've had a great group of conservators working on it and beginning to get it to a much more stable condition.

McEdwards: It looks huge.

Crew: It is huge. It's more than 40 feet in one direction and 34 feet in the other direction. I think people are surprised, when they get near, to see how large it really is.

McEdwards: I also read that there are little pieces, little fragments of it, missing, and that it's quite possible that somebody out there has little pieces of this flag in their sock drawer. Is that true?

Crew: Well, we hope it's not in sock drawers, but it is true that back in the 1800s, as a sort of a tradition, people would give snippets to individuals of either some importance or people who were ancestors of individuals that fought during the battle. So there were pieces that disappeared over time, and part of what we're trying to do now is to recover some of them and sort of have a reunion of the pieces here in the museum.

McEdwards: Describe the process of removing the stitches, doing the stitching. I gather it's quite intricate.

Crew: It really is. There were about 2 million stitches put into the flag back around the turn of the century, using a really wonderful conservation process then, used by a woman by the name of Mrs. Fowler. But since then, we've realized that there are other things we could do to make the preservation work better. So over the last year or so, the staff has been very carefully snipping each of those pieces of work and then trying to free the linen from the back of the flag. It's been very interesting and very challenging for the staff.

McEdwards: I'll bet. And how close is it to being done?

Crew: Well, they've removed the linen backing and now are in the process of analyzing what we want to do for our next steps. I would say, hopefully, in the next year or so, we'd have this part of the work finished.

McEdwards: Will the flag ever fly again, Dr. Crew?

Crew: Oh, no, the flag will not fly again. What we know we'll have to do is really to make sure that it's not harmed, not to display it at any more than about a 30-degree angle. So what we're trying to decide now is how we're going to go about that and what's the best thing we can do to make sure this flag is available not only for us, but for generations of grandchildren for years to come. Our hope is that, if we do this carefully, we can extend the life of the flag from anywhere from 500 to 1,000 years from now.