Concerned with keeping up the spirits of those gunners detailed to spend their enlistment in the dank confines of a casemate, in 1845 the US War Department initiated a program by which pleasant greenery was established within close proximity of casemates' rear openings. "With ready access to life-giving chlorophyll," said Secretary of War William L. Marcy, "our fighting men will be the envy of the world's armies. Why, their opponents will be green with envy, so to speak! Ha! Ha! Ha!"

Naturally, none of this is true. It's an unchecked weed. What is true, however, is that Secretary (also Governor of New York, Secretary of State and Congressman (although not simultaneously)) Marcy's image adorned the Series 1880 $1000 Silver Certificate, which was issued from 1878 to 1897. And he looked none too happy about it.