I remember reading it was the coat of arms of the family that founded the colony. Interesting fact, the US culture was heavily German until we entered WW1 resulting in the majority of the US abandoning their heritage seemingly overnight.

It's fricking atrocious. The whole thing.

But if you Google "ugliest flag designs" it always comes up in the middle because the authors always go for " OMG I CAN'T EVEN LETS UNPACK THIS SO RACIST."

They'd say that is an eyesore merely because they claim it's a subliminal Confederate war flag. Even if true, they let that factor into whether a flag is visually ugly or not.

Not to be confused with the flag of the Kingdom of Ireland.