From the Lincoln assassination inquiry to the Buddhist flag
Henry Steel Olcott was a US Army colonel who helped investigate the assassination of Abraham Lincoln in 1865. Fifteen years later he became one of the first Americans of European descent to formally take up Buddhism, and in 1885 he advised the committee that designed the five-colored Buddhist flag now flown by Buddhist communities worldwide.
How we know
Henry Steel Olcott (1832-1907): US Army colonel, assisted the investigation of Lincoln's assassination in 1865; with H.P. Blavatsky took the Three Refuges and Five Precepts in Ceylon in 1880 (first Westerners to do so formally, per Wikipedia); advised the design of the Buddhist flag in 1885 — the flag has five distinct colors (blue, yellow, red, white, orange) in six stripes, with the sixth stripe combining all five. Sources: Wikipedia 'Henry Steel Olcott'; Wikipedia 'Buddhist flag'. Graph Author bud-henry-olcott (b. 1832, d. 1907).
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