I get chills recalling the sheer power of art that I felt in this room at the National Portrait Gallery, as if the genius loci of Washington, D.C. was standing next to me like a ghost.

Each November, thousands hike to a northern Utah canyon to see a giant U.S. flag honoring Maj. Brent Taylor, a former North Ogden mayor killed in Afghanistan.

American flags line some of Huntington’s streets in a project known as Operation Fly a Flag. Business owner Kelvin Jones, who ...