American flag received by Rebbe Yosef Yitzchak Schneersohn – Rebbe Rayatz of Lubavitch, during his visit with the president of the United States, Herbert Hoover in the White House in 1930, with which he sailed ten years later in 1940, when escaping Nazi Europe for the United States.
A large American flag (with 48 white stars. Nowadays, after Alaska and Hawaii joined the Union, the flag bears fifty stars).
A letter of authenticity is enclosed (handwritten note, in English), signed in Hebrew by Rebbetzin Chanah Gurary (1899-1991), eldest daughter of Rebbe Rayatz: "I hereby gift… the American Flag that my father [the Rayatz] received at the White House during His visit with the President [Herbert Hoover]. One of the private secretaries of the President gave it to him as a parting gift. The flag has 48 stars representing the 48 States at the time. My father gave it to Mordechai Dubin for safekeeping. Before leaving Latvia in 1940, my father asked Dubin for the flag. We took it on the boat to America and my father told my son [Shalom Ber – Barry Gurary] to open it full size and wave it when we left Europe. People cheered on the boat. Also when we saw the Statue of Liberty my father told my son to wave it. At the Greystone hotel a few days after we arrived my father gave it to me as a gift". Dated 10th September 1989.

Some two years after his release from the Soviet prison and settling in Riga, Rebbe Rayatz made a trip to the United States. Towards the end of the trip, which lasted for close to a year (Elul 1929-Tammuz 1930), the Rayatz met with Herbert Hoover, president of the United States, in the White House (on 14th Tammuz). During their meeting, the Rayatz thanked the president for the freedom of religion given to American Jewry and for the help his government provides to Jews throughout the world.
The Rayatz came to the United States accompanied with his son-in-law R. Shemaryahu Gurary (the Rashag), his uncle R. Moshe Horenstein (son-in-law of the Maharash) and R. Mordechai Dubin (a Chabad Chassid, prominent communal activist in Europe, member of the Latvian parliament instrumental in attaining the Rayatz's release from prison and exit from Russia). The objective of the trip was to raise awareness of the plight of Soviet Jews and to encourage and strengthen American Jewry.
Wherever he went, the Rayatz campaigned to strengthen and fortify Torah observance, and propagandized for Shabbat observance, laying tefillin and establishing Torah classes. He founded Agudas Chassidei Chabad and women's societies to promote Taharat HaMishpacha. On Shabbat, he would hold gatherings and deliver Chassidic teachings, and on weekdays, he would convene various meetings and receive people in private audiences. The Rayatz ended his visit on Thursday, 21st Tammuz 1930. He set sail from the port of New York on SS Bremen and reached Berlin on 27th Tammuz. After spending several weeks in the Marienbad health spa, the Rayatz returned in the middle of Elul 1930 to his home in Riga.
In 1933, the Rayatz moved to Warsaw and in 1935, settled in Otwosk. Several days after WWII broke out (Elul 1939), the Rayatz returned to Warsaw. During these difficult times, he was compelled to flee from one house to another in fear of raids and bombings, and false rumors circulated that he had been arrested and executed by the Germans. With the intervention of the American government and the help of several German officers, the Rayatz succeeded in escaping Warsaw, together with some twenty family members and associates, and at the end of Adar 1940 he left occupied Europe and set sail on the Drottningholm from the port of Gothenburg, Sweden, for America. According to the enclosed letter, the Rayatz took with him the present American flag, which he had received a decade earlier at his meeting with the President of the United States, and instructed his grandson to wave it when the ship left Europe, and when they reached America, near the Statue of Liberty.

After his arrival in the United States, the rebbe stayed for a while in the Greystone Hotel in Manhattan, and later settled in Crown Heights, Brooklyn, where he reestablished the Chabad court and its institutions and continued his activities for another ten years, until his passing on 10th Shevat 1950. He was succeeded by Rebbe Menachem Mendel Schneersohn, the Lubavitcher Rebbe.

Approx. 173X115 cm. Fair-good condition. Stains. Small open tear to one corner. Tears and fraying to all 48 stars.