Design of the March 12-14, 2004 Event

The Three Flags Ceremony will begin, unofficially, when delegations attending the ceremony arrive on March 11, 2004. On March 12, groups including a Franco-American delegation from the Friends of Vieilles Maisons Francaises and representatives from the Historic New Orleans Collection will visit major French colonial sites in Cahokia, Illinois, and Ste. Genevieve, Missouri.
On March 13, 2004, guests will visit the Lewis and Clark Bicentennial exhibit at the Missouri History Museum and the Osage art exhibit at the Saint Louis Art Museum. That evening, Les Amis, the region's French colonial heritage preservation group, will present a Creole Ball at which guests will meet costumed actors portraying the original participants in the historic event
March 14, 2004, will open with a service at the Cathedral Basilica, featuring Spanish liturgical music. Guests and spectators will gather under the Gateway Arch for the Three Flags Ceremony that afternoon. Presiding over the original event were Colonel Charles Delassus, the French-born Spanish governor of Upper Louisiana, and Captain Amos Stoddard, who functioned as representative for both French and American governments. In their place will be the current heads of the three nations. The re-creation of the ceremony of raising and lowering the flags will be followed by musical performances. Guests will also be able to view the Treaty of the Louisiana Purchase itself, on display at the JNEM's museum of westward expansion, located below the Arch. We expect that this impressive event, with such diverse and entertaining elements and including important political figures, will garner international press coverage.