In 1853, on a remote stretch of Washington Territory, a handful of settlers gathered around John R. Jackson’s cabin with scraps of fabric and a shared sense of purpose. What began as a simple request for a celebratory flag quickly became a community project that stitched neighbors and a young nation together. The result was the first U.S. flag ever made in Washington, a handmade emblem of belonging on the far edge of a new nation.
John R. Jackson’s Journey West to Establish the Highlands Homestead
Born in Staindrop, England, on January 13, 1800, John R. Jackson first came to the United States in 1823 (though some records suggest 1833), settling briefly in New York before eventually migrating west to Illinois, where he established his first homestead. In 1844, he joined the wave of emigrants traveling the Oregon Trail, arriving in what was then known as northern Oregon (present-day Washington) late that year.
By early 1845, drawn north by reports of the rushing waters of the Deschutes River, he journeyed on to the Newaukum and Chehalis Rivers, finally claiming a high prairie on a plain near the Cowlitz Trail at a homestead he named “The Highlands,” making the Jackson family one of the first non-Indigenous settlers north of the Columbia River, on land that would later be called Jackson Prairie (near present-day Toledo).
In his travels, Jackson occasionally visited Oregon City, and while there in 1848, he met a widow, Matilda Koontz, whose husband had drowned while crossing a river along the Oregon Trail. Jackson and Matilda soon married, and she brought her four sons home to the Highlands, where the homestead became a well-known stopping point along the Cowlitz Trail, the main thoroughfare between the Columbia River and Puget Sound.
Jackson had already begun his public service career, serving as the inaugural tax assessor for Lewis County in 1846 and the county’s first elected sheriff the following year. He later served as a delegate at the Monticello Convention, which led to the creation of Washington Territory, and over the years he worked as a probate judge, court clerk, justice of the peace, tax collector, Washington Territory representative, census worker, and even a local butcher, while Matilda gained her own reputation as an accomplished cook and hostess.
Monticello Convention and the Creation of Washington Territory in 1853
Of course, Jackson was not the only one heading north. By the 1840s, a steady flood of settlers had begun pouring onto the lands above the Columbia River, each family chasing the same dream of open prairie and new beginnings that had brought Jackson to the Highlands. But as the population grew, so did the frustrations. Basic needs, such as mail delivery, roads, military protection, and law enforcement, went largely ignored by the distant territorial government in Oregon City, which refused to increase spending for the growing northern settlements.
Adding to the resentment, the powerful Hudson’s Bay Company controlled the region’s best agricultural land, and its livestock regularly wandered onto settlers’ claims with no legal recourse. By 1851, patience had worn thin.
That summer, residents gathered at a small Independence Day celebration in Olympia, where an impassioned speech about a future “state of Columbia” lit a fire under the crowd. Delegates were elected, and a convention assembled at Cowlitz Landing in August 1851, drafting a 1,500-word petition to Congress detailing their grievances. The real turning point came in October 1852, when a group of delegates met at John R. Jackson’s own homestead, the Jackson Courthouse, the first recognized courthouse north of the Columbia River, to formally plan a second convention.
Just weeks later, on November 25, 1852, forty-four delegates gathered in the small town of Monticello and signed the Monticello Convention Memorial, a well-argued petition calling for the creation of a new territory named “Columbia.” Among those who signed was John R. Jackson himself, joining notable founders of Seattle such as Arthur A. Denny and Doc Maynard.
The petition reached Washington, D.C., and on January 25, 1853, a bill to establish the Territory of Columbia was introduced in the House. Debate arose not over whether the territory should be created, but over its name. Representative Richard H. Stanton of Kentucky proposed “Washington” instead, to avoid confusion with the nation’s capital. The bill passed the House on February 10, the Senate on March 2, and on that same day, President Millard Fillmore signed it into law.
First U.S. Flag Made in Washington Territory is Flown on a Frontier Fourth of July
When news of Washington Territory’s official creation finally reached the settlers north of the Columbia River in the spring of 1853, John R. Jackson knew the moment demanded something special. He sent away to San Francisco for bolts of red and white cloth, intending to sew a large American flag to fly on the coming Fourth of July.
The material arrived just in time, and neighbors gathered at the Highlands homestead to help. Matilda Jackson and other women from the community took up needles and thread, working together to stitch a 6-foot by 15-foot banner. But there was a problem when they ran short of fabric. Unable to make the full 13 stripes, they adapted, completing the flag with only eight stripes instead, a quirk that would make this handmade emblem instantly recognizable for generations to come.
On the morning of July 4, 1853, the settlers raised a tall flagpole near the Jackson cabin. The eight-striped banner unfurled in the breeze, becoming the first U.S. flag ever made in Washington Territory. Later that day, the same flag was flown at a larger celebration a few miles south at Cowlitz Landing, where settlers packed gunpowder into 13 large fir logs and set them off like homemade cannons in a thunderous celebration. The Declaration of Independence was read aloud, toasts were given by Jackson and numerous others, and a banquet table shaded by a canopy of fir branches and piled high with pioneer fare before them.
That venerable flag, stitched by neighbors in a frontier cabin, survived. Today, it rests in the collection of the Washington State Historical Society in Tacoma. The Jackson cabin still stands as well, preserved as a Washington State Parks Heritage Site along the Jackson Highway, just a short distance from Matilda Jackson State Park and Lewis and Clark State Park.
A Stitch in the Nation’s 250-Year Story
The first flag made in Washington was never an official government issue. It was a product of necessity, improvisation, and neighborly cooperation as a homespun banner sewn by hand because a handful of settlers on the far edge of a young nation wanted to declare, in fabric and thread, that they belonged.
John R. Jackson and his community did not wait for permission to celebrate their new territory. They simply ordered cloth, gathered their families, and raised their flag. As the United States approaches its 250th anniversary, that humble, eight-striped relic reminds us that patriotism is often made not in grand capitals and courtrooms, but in small spaces and by ordinary people who take it upon themselves to stitch a symbol of hope and hang it in the wind.
