by Paula Allen, San Antonio Express-News, December 17, 2022
Gerry Uecker finds program from a play titled “Five Flags Furled in Texas”. It was presented at the Municipal Auditorium on Nov. 2, 1931. Program cover shows all six flags in an illustration captioned “Texas through six political periods”. Last of the play’s three acts ends in 1831 at Stephen F. Austin’s colony under the Mexican flag. W.
Frances Scarborough (1902-1959) was an overachiever, and Texas history was pre-eminent among her many interests. Her first and apparently only book, “Stories from the History of Texas,” was published in 1929 by Southwest Press. She wrote syndicated feature stories, such as “The Millions of Bats of Carlsbad Caverns”. Laura Scarborough’s “Five Flags Furled in Texas” was published in 1930, a year before it would be performed. The first-time author was still in her 20s; she wrote the play for a Masonic organization’s convention in San Antonio.
Her play was presented Nov. 2, 1931, the first night of the convention; it changed a lot by the time it reached the stage. The play was intended to be about the founding of San Antonio’s government. Members of the Confederate Veterans protested its showing, citing the Confederate flag.
