On this day, with an act of Congress, the United States officially adopted “The Star-Spangled Banner” as the American national anthem. Written by British composer John Stafford Smith, the melody was originally a drinking song and the club anthem of the Anacreontic Society in London in about 1776. The song was entitled “To Anacreon in Heaven” and the original lyrics were written by Ralph Tomlinson, the president of the Anacreontic Society. The melody was used frequently over the years with lyrics that changed according to the affairs of the day, until 14th September 1814, when Francis Scott Key penned the lyrics that would become, with occasional variations, the definitive version, and the title became “The Star-Spangled Banner”.
