This is a chain e-mail I received. Perhaps it would be interesting to our readers.

Who Was Haym Solomon? Read this fascinating history of the $1 bill - all the way to the bottom to know about Haym Solomon.

You may be in for quite a surprise

13 signers of the Declaration of Independence ,
13 stripes on our flag,
13 steps on the pyramid,
13 letters in 'Annuit Coeptis',
13 letters in ' E Pluribus Unum,'
13 stars above the eagle,
13 bars on that shield,
13 leaves on the olive branch,
13 fruits, and if you look closely,
13 arrows.

And finally, notice the arrangement of the 13 stars in the right-hand circle. You will see that they are arranged as a Star of David.

This was ordered by George Washington who, when he asked Haym Solomon, a wealthy Philadelphia Jew, what he would like as a personal reward for his services to the Continental Army. Solomon said he wanted nothing for himself, but he would like something for his people. The Star of David was the result. Few people know it was Solomon who saved the Army through his financial contributions ...then died a pauper.

Hayim Solomon (whose name is also rendered as Haym Salomon) was a real person, a Polish-born Jew who immigrated to the American colonies in the 1770s, joined the New York branch of the Sons of Liberty, and performed many services on behalf of the American independence movement, most notably helping to provide funding for the colonial war effort during the American Revolution.

However, the claim that George Washington ordered the Great Seal of the United States to incorporate a Star of David element as a token of thanks to Solomon is apocryphal: Washington had no input into the design of the Great Seal, and the original design specification for the Great Seal included no instructions about how the constellation of 13 stars on the obverse side should be arranged.

The reason why artist Robert Scot chose to arrange that constellation of 13 stars into the shape of a hexagram when engraving the first die of the Great Seal in 1782 (a design feature that has been reproduced in all subsequent dies of the Great Seal) is unknown, but the best guess is that he was emulating the arrangement of stars on the first American flag.