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Sacramento, California (U.S)

Sacramento County

image by António Martins-Tuválkin, 18 May 2008
based on www.nava.org

Description of the flag
1964-1989 flag

See also:

Sacramento County
Municipal flags of California (index page)
California
United States of America

Description of the flag

Modern design of green, blue, white, navy blue and orange, designed to look like a river flowing across the landscape.

Found accidentally, a photo of the flag of Sacramento: www.tommyersphotography.com/detail.asp?PhotoID=2620. Horizontally edged by thin white stripes which do not appear on the image above. The green and yellow figures seem to be exactly halved disks.
Jan Mertens, 22 August 2007

The flag shows a very stylized river view (or map), with a white broad meander-like "S" going from lower hoist to upper fly separating a (very very) dark blue upper hoist field from a (very) dark blue lower fly; on the former, a dark green ellipse cut at the upper hoist and a another, golden yellow, at the lower fly. At the bottom, in an over-spaced sans-serif grotesque face (Futura?), the name "City of Sacramento".
António Martins-Tuválkin, 18 May 2008

1964-1989 flag

image by Rob Raeside, 30 July 2014

The design of the previous Sacramento flag resulted from of the efforts of E. A. Combatalade, the founder of the Camellia Festival Association that held an annual celebration in the city. Combatalade felt that the city should have a flag to celebrate its 125th anniversary, especially since it was one of the last major California cities without a flag. He suggested key design elements to Goodwin & Cole, flag manufacturers, who prepared a sketch of a possible flag. Combatalade took the sketch to Max Depew, assistant editor of the Sacramento Bee, who thought that the elements could be rearranged more attractively. He and Combatalade made a new sketch of what ultimately became the city's first flag. The city council officially adopted the design on 23 January 1964. The flag's proportions are 7:11. The white field has four major elements. Centered at the hoist is the C. P. Huntington locomotive, in profile toward the fly, commemorating Sacramento as the terminus of the nation's first transcontinental railroad. The locomotive is black with a red side, a red "cow-catcher" in front, and a red coal tender following. Centered at the fly is a Pony Express rider on horseback, headed at full gallop toward the hoist, marking Sacramento's role as the western terminus of the Pony Express. The rider, bent over the horse, wears a coonskin cap, a red kerchief and red shirt, and dark blue pants. In the lower center, extending from slightly above the field's midpoint down about one-third of the flag's width is the state capitol dome, denoting Sacramento as the state's capital. The dome is gold, supported by two stories of white columns detailed in black. At the base of this figure is a red camellia flower, a green leaf on either side. In the upper center, above the dome, is a bearded miner, kneeling by a stream, panning for gold, and symbolizing the discovery of gold in California. The figure is in partial profile toward the hoist. He wears a brown wide-brimmed hat, a red shirt, and black pants. A miner's pick-ax lies on the ground at his right. Arched over the miner's head in the center of the field is SACRAMENTO; running horizontally and centered below the camellia is CALIFORNIA, all in blue block letters.
Ben Cahoon, 30 July 2014