Virginia group buys land to fly Confederate battle flag over I-95

A group of Virginia residents say that they are purchasing a plot of land and intend to use it to fly a 15-foot Confederate battle flag in the view of motorists driving on Interstate 95 near Richmond.

In a message on the Free North Carolina website, Susan Hathaway explained that the group Virginia Flaggers would begin installing the flag next week.

"The Va Flaggers are THRILLED to announce that we have finalized a lease to acquire property adjacent to Interstate 95, just South of Richmond, and will be erecting a 50’ pole, on which a 10 x15 Confederate Battle Flag will fly 24/7, 365 days of the year," Hathaway wrote. "The flag will serve to welcome visitors and commuters to Richmond, and remind them of our honorable Confederate history and heritage."

She said that the group had received an "excellent deal on a pole" and would "complete this project at a cost of just under $3,000."

Last year while protesting the Museum of the Confederacy's decision not to fly the flag in front of the museum, Hathaway told The Richmond Times-Dispatch that groups likes the Ku Klux Klan had tarnished the reputation of the Confederacy.

"It's a symbol of my ancestors and what they fought for and what they gave their lives for in a lot of cases," she explained. "We feel like it's dishonoring them to put some kind of shame on the flag and make it something that has to be hidden."

In 2008, the Sons of Confederate Veterans in Tampa raised what they said was the world's largest Confederate flag over one of the busiest highways in Florida.

Watch this video from Virginia Flaggers, uploaded in 2012.

(h/t: Mother Jones)