From turkey feathers to Blue Hills: The top picks for Mass.'s new flag, seal and motto

A whale, turkey feathers, Blue Hills, rejoicing in the "public good." Those are just a few of the top picks for the new state flag, motto and seal. The Massachusetts Seal, Flag and Motto Advisory Commission on Thursday officially narrowed it down to three selections for each category, down from 1,165 total submissions from residents.

These nine designs are not final, according to co-chair and Massachusetts Office of Travel and Tourism Executive Director Kate Fox at the commission's meeting. They represent the top scoring selections from commission members, and could change as the commission seeks feedback through a series of public hearings, both virtual and in person, statewide this fall.

"That public feedback may further shape and refine these submissions so that the end result reflects the voices of the people we serve," Fox said.

The selections for the new flag, clockwise from the left, depict six turkey feathers, a star and waves upon a blue hill and a mayflower. All three designs feature the number six, as Massachusetts was the sixth state to join the union.

For the seal, submissions from left to right, depict a North Atlantic right whale and white chickadee, the star from the current flag turned into a sun on a stylized Massachusetts landscape and turkey feathers surrounding a chickadee.

For the motto, the selections are:

More details on each category is available on the commission's website.

The commission has hired Eastern Research Group (ERG), of Concord, to help refine the design, according to Fox.

"The final options don't need to be these," said Fox. "These are ideas to inspire the direction, and we do have a creative services agency who will take all the feedback and turn it into potential new emblems for the state."

The commission then will present its final recommendations to the Legislature, which has final voting power, in December. 

A few commission members, including Elizabeth Solomon, a member of the Massachusett tribe at Ponkapoag, and Rhonda Anderson, expressed concern that the rubrics and scoring systems they used to narrow the selections may have left out other worthy designs.

"We have to be cognizant of the reasoning behind this redesign in the first place, and that that has come out of the local Indigenous community," said Solomon. "To move from something that basically the Indigenous community found offensive to something that completely ignores the Indigenous community is incredibly problematic."

The state's current state seal, which also appears on the flag, has been in place since 1898, and depicts a severed arm hold a sword above an Indigenous person who's holding a bow and arrow. It's been condemned as racist and harmful toward the state's Native population.

This move to redesign the state's emblems is the second attempt since 2020, after a 2023 endeavor folded without any concrete recommendations.