One local resident commented: “All the people living there fly the flag whenever one of them has something to celebrate.” Many Norwegians observe official flag days like New Year’s Day and some religious holidays, and it’s common for Norwegians to fly the flag on their birthdays or put strings of flags on the Christmas tree,
[...] Norwegian kings took part in the Crusades in the Middle East to liberate Jerusalem and other holy sites from Muslim occupation. They were perhaps inspired to use the Christian cross for their own banner designs at home.
[...] in 1821 when Fredrik Meltzer, a politician from Bergen, convinced Parliament to choose the flag that Norway has today. Meltzer reckoned that red, white and blue were already the colours of several freedom-loving democratic nations like the United States, Britain, and the Netherlands. A cross would also reflect the tradition and style already in use by Norway’s neighbours. It was, moreover, a polite design, combining the blue in Sweden’s flag (albeit much darker) with the red and white of Denmark’s. It was a simple pattern. And it was cheap, Meltzer pointed out – it could be made by cutting up a Danish flag and adding some blue material.
[...]
The Norwegian flag and its use remained a problem in the union, though. [...] Both countries could use their own flag, but with a clear symbol of their union. That wasn’t popular in either country, and the solution was nicknamed sildesalaten (herring salad) referring to its resulting strange mix of colours. Led by nation-builders like Bjørnstjerne Bjørnson, flag politics got very divisive towards the end of the 1800s, adding to the forces that finally blew Norway’s union with Sweden apart in 1905.
[...] The rapidly growing Labour Party, dominated by communists at the time, saw the national flag as a bourgeois passion. Defining the church as a tool for oppression, radicals didn’t like the symbolism of a Christian cross either. [...]
Labour’s moderate wing eventually pushed through a “take back the flag” strategy in the 1930s, clearing the way for Norwegian flags in May Day parades along with the socialist red ones. That turned out to be a fortunate move a few years later, with the outbreak of World War II, the occupation of Norway by Germany and the rise to power of a puppet Nazi party in Norway known as Nasjonal Samling (NS). [...] That led to conflicting policies like allowing the Norwegian flag to fly from poles, but not hand-held ones. Demonstratively wearing garments in the flag’s clours was controversial, too. The red nisselue, a red wool hat worn by Norway’s version of Santa Claus (julenissen) and popular among common folk during the war years, was downright verboten by the Germans. After liberation in May 1945, Norway exploded in a formidable flag feast, re-establishing the flag as a tool for the people.
