A 74-year-old retired painter and decorator collects flags and currently has 680 flags, including one flag of every country and US state.
Alex Adlam has Britain’s biggest private collection of flags which he keeps folded up in boxes at his home in Cheltenham, Gloucestershire.
Alex started collecting flags 12 years ago and has spent around £4,000 on purchasing the 680 flags, including one flag of every country and US state.
He told SWNS: “I keep buying more I’m very passionate about my flags.
I now have to look for unusual ones as I have got all the common ones. I’d always had an interest in geography and history and that lends itself to taking an interest in flags so I got a pole and started to buy a few.”
“It’s a subject that’s absolutely wonderful – it’s an education to me. What are they depicting?”
He even has four flagpoles at his home and flies different flags every day with fun facts about the flags on a notice board.
He said: “I like to get the flags up by 6:30am every day after I feed the cats. I then take them down around 8pm, depending on the time of year.”
Alex also allows residents to leave a request in a suggestion box for a particular flag to be flown.
Alex said: “One woman put four names of flags down just the other day – I happened to have three but didn’t have the city of Amsterdam one. I’ve ordered it for her.”
He says his rarest and favourite flag is a 48-star American flag. It was awarded to the Post Office in Bristol after the Second World War. It was used from 1912 to 1959.
He flies different flags on different days. He said: “September is Battle of Britain Day so I’ll fly the RAF flag. October is Trafalgar Day so I will fly the Royal Navy flag.”
“In June it’s Armed Forces Day so I will fly an Armed Forces Day flag and in November you fly the Remembrance flag.”
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