“O say does that star-spangled banner yet wave
O’er the land of the free and the home of the brave?”
first verse
O say can you see, by the dawn’s early light,
What so proudly we hail’d at the twilight’s last gleaming,
Whose broad stripes and bright stars through the perilous fight
O’er the ramparts we watch’d were so gallantly streaming?
And the rocket’s red glare, the bombs bursting in air,
Gave proof through the night that our flag was still there,
O say does that star-spangled banner yet wave
O’er the land of the free and the home of the brave?
Song quote, Star Spangled Banner, 1814. Lyrics by Francis Scott Key, poet. Based on the popular British song Anacreontic Society written by John Stafford Smith in 1812.
More
More than a century later, in 1916, President Woodrow Wilson signed an executive order designating “The Star-Spangled Banner” as the national anthem, and in 1931, the US Congress confirmed the decision
And the missing verses? The Forgotten Verses of “The Star-Spangled Banner
Art of Quotation 