To Dip or Not to Dip, That Is Zagunis’s Question

LONDON – To dip or not to dip, that is the question before Mariel Zagunis, the flag bearer for Team USA, as she marches past the Royal Box on Friday at the opening ceremony.

The issue is a delicate one. By tradition, the American flag is not to be dipped to any person or thing, a nod to the country’s democratic roots and rejection of monarchs. At the same time, the Queen is Great Britain’s head of state and it is traditional to dip the flag to her.

There’s a strong chance, though, that American tradition will trump British hospitality. The United States stopped dipping its flag at the opening ceremony in Berlin in 1936, when the American team refused to pay homage to Hitler. Since then, American Olympic teams have marched in numerous host nations with monarchs, including Japan, Norway and Spain and not dipped the Stars and Stripes.

Yet the question continues to be raised, including Thursday at a news conference here where Zagunis, a two-time gold medal winner in fencing, was chosen to carry the American flag. Zagunis said the honor of being chosen by her teammates was special because for the first time women outnumber men on the team, and because this year is the 40th anniversary of Title IX, which sparked a boom in women’s athletics.

Yet when asked whether she would dip the flag, Zagunis appeared flummoxed. Patrick Sandusky, a spokesman for the United States Olympic Committee, jumped in. There is no policy that obligates the flag bearer to dip or not dip the flag, he said. Zagunis, it would appear, has the final say-so. But precedent suggests that she will heed history and not dip the flag.

“The history of the team has been that the flag stays high,” said Harvey Schiller, who was executive director of the U.S.O.C. in the 1990s and told flag bearers not to dip the flag, including Francie Larrieu Smith in Barcelona in 1992. “I remembered the history.”

Flag dipping was an issue before the 1936 Games and much of it is linked to the 1908 Olympic Games also held here. Olympic Committee protocols published in British newspapers at the time stated that all flags should be “lowered to the salute and three cheers will be called from the whole of the teams for His Majesty,” according to an article in the Journal of Olympic History. The protocols also said that when exiting the stadium, “each column on passing the Royal Party will salute.”

During the opening ceremony, however, the flag bearer Ralph Rose kept the flag erect as he passed King Edward VII’s box. Why he did this is shrouded in mystery. One legend has it that Martin Sheridan, a nine-time medal winner who was born in Ireland, reportedly said that “this flag dips to no earthly king.”

It took about a half century, though, before the quote was picked up in the media and by then, Sheridan had been dead more than 30 years. Newspaper reports in 1908 say that Rose gave no reason for not lowering the flag.

Some historians have surmised Rose kept the flag straight because the Americans were angry that their flag was not flying above the stadium along with those of other nations. The leaders of the American delegation, many of whom traced their roots to Ireland, took umbrage, especially because Irish athletes were forced to compete for Britain, according to this theory.

“Sometimes, athletes can take it as a snub,” said David Davis, the author of “Showdown at Shepherd’s Bush,” which chronicles the epic marathon at the 1908 Olympics. “Ireland was under the yoke of the British, so this could have been their sympathy.”

The trouble is that another photograph also shows the American delegation dipping the flag when it lined up in the infield with the other teams, according to Bob Wilcock, the vice president of the Society of Olympic Collectors and the co-curator of Olympic-themed exhibit at the British Library.

Curiously, the British newspapers made no mention of the flag not being dipped. “It’s only later, in folklore and myth, that the Americans were interested in it,” Wilcock said, adding that the Americans did not dip their flag when the Olympics were held in London in 1948.

If the Americans stay true to form and the flag is not dipped on Friday when it passes the Royal Box, “no offense would be taken because we recognize it’s American custom,” Wilcock said.