The Illinois Centennial half dollar is a
commemorative 50-cent piece struck by the
United States Bureau of the Mint in 1918. The
obverse
Obverse and its opposite, reverse, refer to the two flat faces of coins and some other two-sided objects, including paper money, flags, seals, medals, drawings, old master prints and other works of art, and printed fabrics. In this usage, ...
, depicting
Abraham Lincoln
Abraham Lincoln ( ; February 12, 1809 – April 15, 1865) was an American lawyer, politician, and statesman who served as the 16th president of the United States from 1861 until his assassination in 1865. Lincoln led the nation thro ...
, was designed by
Chief Engraver George T. Morgan; the reverse, based on the
Seal of Illinois
The Great Seal of the State of Illinois is the official emblem of the state, and signifies the official nature of a document produced by the state of Illinois. The flag of the state of Illinois consists of the seal of Illinois on a white backg ...
, was by his assistant and successor,
John R. Sinnock
John Ray Sinnock (July 8, 1888 – May 14, 1947) was the eighth Chief Engraver of the United States Mint from 1925 to 1947.
History
Sinnock was the designer of the Roosevelt dime and Franklin half dollar, among other U.S. coins. His initials ca ...
. Morgan's obverse is based on the statue by
Andrew O'Connor.
A commemorative was wanted by the
State of Illinois
Illinois ( ) is a U.S. state, state in the Midwestern United States, Midwestern United States. Its largest metropolitan areas include the Chicago metropolitan area, and the Metro East section, of Greater St. Louis. Other smaller metropolita ...
to mark the centennial of its 1818 admission to
the Union, and in 1918, legislation was introduced into Congress to accomplish this. It met no opposition, though several amendments were made during the legislative process. After it passed, the two engravers produced designs, but Treasury Secretary
William G. McAdoo
William Gibbs McAdoo Jr.McAdoo is variously differentiated from family members of the same name:
* Dr. William Gibbs McAdoo (1820–1894) – sometimes called "I" or "Senior"
* William Gibbs McAdoo (1863–1941) – sometimes called "II" or "Ju ...
required changes, not all of which were made.
The coins were minted in August 1918, and were sold to the public for $1 each. All sold, though many were held by a bank until 1933, and the profits used to defray the cost of local centennial celebrations or to help those in need because of
World War I
World War I (28 July 1914 11 November 1918), often abbreviated as WWI, was one of the deadliest global conflicts in history. Belligerents included much of Europe, the Russian Empire, the United States, and the Ottoman Empire, with fightin ...
. Later writers have generally admired the coin, considering it one of the more handsome American commemoratives. The coin is valued in the hundreds of dollars today, though exceptional specimens may trade for more.
Legislation
The State of Illinois wanted a commemorative coin to be issued for the centennial of its 1818 admission to the Union. A bill that would accomplish this, H.R. 8764, was introduced into the
U.S. House of Representatives
The United States House of Representatives, often referred to as the House of Representatives, the U.S. House, or simply the House, is the lower chamber of the United States Congress, with the Senate being the upper chamber. Together they ...
on January 16, 1918 by that state's
Loren E. Wheeler. It was referred to the Committee on Coinage, Weights, and Measures,
which held hearings on March 5. Wheeler told the committee (of which he was not a member) that the coins were desired for distribution during the celebrations in Illinois. He had been to see Treasury Secretary
William G. McAdoo
William Gibbs McAdoo Jr.McAdoo is variously differentiated from family members of the same name:
* Dr. William Gibbs McAdoo (1820–1894) – sometimes called "I" or "Senior"
* William Gibbs McAdoo (1863–1941) – sometimes called "II" or "Ju ...
and Mint Director
Raymond T. Baker. Neither had any objection to the legislation, though McAdoo had explained that the problem with commemorative coins was that they did not sell as well as expected, and many were returned to the Mint for melting. After telling of his meeting with the officials, Wheeler explained to the committee that the coins would be purchased by the State Treasurer of Illinois and so there would be no returns.
James L. Slayden
James Luther Slayden (June 1, 1853 – February 24, 1924) was an American politician, cotton merchant, and rancher. He was elected from San Antonio to United States United States House of Representatives, House of Representatives, serving eleven c ...
of Texas asked what the cost to the federal government would be, but Wheeler did not know. Slayden asked what had been the cost for the 1916–1917
McKinley Birthplace Memorial dollar
The McKinley Birthplace Memorial gold dollar was a commemorative coin struck by the United States Bureau of the Mint in 1916 and 1917, depicting the 25th President of the United States, William McKinley. The coin's obverse was designed by Charl ...
, and Ohio's
William A. Ashbrook
William Albert Ashbrook (July 1, 1867 – January 1, 1940) was an American businessman, newspaper publisher, and Democratic Party (United States), Democratic politician from Ohio.
He was born near Johnstown, Ohio, Johnstown, Licking County, Ohi ...
, the chairman of the committee, said that the cost of the dies had been borne by the group purchasing the coins from the government; Ashbrook proposed amending the bill to make this clear this would be an expense to be paid by Illinois. Wheeler had no objection, and stated that to avoid returns, it might be best if the issue was limited to 100,000 coins rather than the 200,000 in the original bill. Ashbrook then asked if the coins were to be sold at a premium by the centennial committee, and Wheeler denied this, indicating that they were to be circulated like any other half dollar. This concluded the public hearing on the bill, with the committee to take further action in
executive session
An executive session is a term for any block within an otherwise open meeting (often of a board of directors or other deliberative assembly) in which minutes are taken separately or not at all, outsiders are not present, and the contents of the dis ...
.
On March 12, Ashbrook submitted a report on behalf of his committee recommending passage of the bill once it had been amended to reduce the authorized mintage from 200,000 to 100,000 and to add a statement that the United States government would not be responsible for the cost of the dies.
Wheeler presented the bill on the floor of the House of Representatives on April 6, 1918. He was quizzed by North Carolina's
Claude Kitchin, who asked whether there had been a unanimous recommendation by the committee, whether McAdoo and Baker had approved the bill, and whether there was precedent for a half dollar in honor of a state's centennial (there was not). Wheeler reassured Kitchin as to the unanimity of the committee, and the approval by the officials, but did not answer the centennial question definitively, instead citing instances of prior commemorative issues (the
Louisiana Purchase Exposition dollar
The Louisiana Purchase Exposition gold dollar is a commemorative coin issue dated 1903. Struck in two varieties, the coins were designed by United States Bureau of the Mint Chief Engraver Charles E. Barber. The pieces were issued to commemorate ...
and the
Panama-Pacific commemorative coins). Ashbrook intervened, assuring Kitchin that his committee had unanimously approved it. Kitchin had no more questions, and the House approved the bill without a recorded vote.
H. R. 8742 was transmitted to the Senate, where it was referred to the Committee on Banking and Currency. That committee's chairman, Oklahoma's
Robert L. Owen, reported it back with an amendment to the full Senate, where the bill was considered on May 21, 1918. The House-passed bill had said the laws relating to the minor coinage of the United States (the cent and nickel) would apply to the coin; this was changed to state that the laws relating to the subsidiary silver coinage (which the half dollar was) would apply. The bill was passed as amended without objection. Later in the day, Illinois Senator
James Hamilton Lewis
James Hamilton Lewis (May 18, 1863 – April 9, 1939) was an American attorney and politician. Sometimes referred to as J. Ham Lewis or Ham Lewis, he represented Washington in the United States House of Representatives, and Illinois in the Unite ...
made a statement which was inserted in the ''
Congressional Record'' at this point, applauding the passage of the honor to his home state, and noting that "more than a hundred thousand of her sons" were then being deployed to the battlefields of
World War I
World War I (28 July 1914 11 November 1918), often abbreviated as WWI, was one of the deadliest global conflicts in history. Belligerents included much of Europe, the Russian Empire, the United States, and the Ottoman Empire, with fightin ...
.
Since the versions the two houses had passed were not identical, the bill returned to the House of Representatives, where on May 25, Arizona's
Carl Hayden
Carl Trumbull Hayden (October 2, 1877 – January 25, 1972) was an American politician. Representing Arizona in the United States Senate from 1927 to 1969, he was the first U.S. Senator to serve seven terms. Serving as the state's first Represe ...
successfully moved that the House agree to the Senate amendment. The Speaker,
Champ Clark
James Beauchamp Clark (March 7, 1850March 2, 1921) was an American politician and attorney who represented Missouri in the United States House of Representatives and served as Speaker of the House from 1911 to 1919.
Born in Kentucky, he establis ...
, felt that the title of the bill might have to be changed for reasons he did not explain, but Hayden disagreed and Clark did not press his point. The bill passed the House,
and was enacted by the signature of President
Woodrow Wilson
Thomas Woodrow Wilson (December 28, 1856February 3, 1924) was an American politician and academic who served as the 28th president of the United States from 1913 to 1921. A member of the Democratic Party, Wilson served as the president of ...
on June 1, 1918.
Preparation and design
![Lincolnstatue](https://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/5/57/Lincolnstatue.jpg)
The designs were prepared internally in the Engraving Department at the
Philadelphia Mint
The Philadelphia Mint in Philadelphia was created from the need to establish a national identity and the needs of commerce in the United States. This led the Founding Fathers of the United States to make an establishment of a continental national ...
. The obverse design, depicting
Abraham Lincoln
Abraham Lincoln ( ; February 12, 1809 – April 15, 1865) was an American lawyer, politician, and statesman who served as the 16th president of the United States from 1861 until his assassination in 1865. Lincoln led the nation thro ...
, was created by Chief Engraver
George T. Morgan. The Chief Engraver worked from a photograph of a statue of Lincoln designed by
Andrew O'Connor and unveiled in
Springfield (the city where Lincoln lived for much of his adult life) in August 1918. Lincoln is shown beardless, as he was when living in Illinois before he was elected president in 1860. He was chosen to be on the coin as Illinois' most famous resident. The obverse also contains the mottoes
LIBERTY and
IN GOD WE TRUST, as well as an inscription noting the centennial.
The reverse was designed by the assistant engraver who would succeed Morgan on his death in 1925,
John R. Sinnock
John Ray Sinnock (July 8, 1888 – May 14, 1947) was the eighth Chief Engraver of the United States Mint from 1925 to 1947.
History
Sinnock was the designer of the Roosevelt dime and Franklin half dollar, among other U.S. coins. His initials ca ...
. It is an adaptation of the
Seal of Illinois
The Great Seal of the State of Illinois is the official emblem of the state, and signifies the official nature of a document produced by the state of Illinois. The flag of the state of Illinois consists of the seal of Illinois on a white backg ...
, an eagle perched on a rock mound, with the rising Sun beyond it. The bird holds in its beak a scroll with the Illinois state motto,
STATE SOVEREIGNTY, NATIONAL UNION and it clutches the Federal shield. An
olive branch
The olive branch is a symbol of peace and victory associated with customs of ancient Greece and connected with supplication to gods and persons in power. It is found in most cultures of the Mediterranean basin and became associated with peace ...
is seen, but without any arrows representing war, even though these symbols are often paired on U.S. coins. Anthony Swiatek and
Walter Breen
Walter Henry Breen Jr. (September 5, 1928 – April 27, 1993) was an American numismatist, writer, and convicted child sex offender; as well as the husband of author Marion Zimmer Bradley. He was known among coin collectors for writing ''Wa ...
suggested "their presence on a coin designed during the concluding months of World War I might have been considered just a bit raw". The reverse also bears the legends,
UNITED STATES OF AMERICA,
E PLURIBUS UNUM
''E pluribus unum'' ( , , ) – Latin for "Out of many, one" (also translated as "One out of many" or "One from many") – is a traditional motto of the United States, appearing on the Great Seal along with '' Annuit cœptis'' (Latin for "he ...
(the national motto, meaning "out of many, one") and
HALF DOLLAR.
![Seal of Illinois](https://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/e/e7/Seal_of_Illinois.svg)
Secretary McAdoo had originally rejected the submissions. Acting Mint Director
Mary M. O'Reilly
Mary Margaret O'Reilly (October 14, 1865 – December 6, 1949) was an American civil servant who served as the assistant director of the United States Bureau of the Mint from 1924 until 1938. One of the United States government's highest- ...
wrote to Philadelphia Mint Superintendent Adam M. Joyce on June 24, 1918, relaying the Treasury Secretary's concerns. McAdoo "specifically direct
d that the Illinois state motto be deleted from the scroll in the eagle's beak on the reverse, to be replaced with the national one. Joyce was told to follow the provisions of the
Coinage Act of 1873
The Coinage Act of 1873 or Mint Act of 1873, was a general revision of laws relating to the Mint of the United States. By ending the right of holders of silver bullion to have it coined into standard silver dollars, while allowing holders of go ...
requiring that on one side there be the word
LIBERTY, a design emblematic of it, and the year of striking, with the other side an eagle with the name of the country and the denomination of the coin. Despite McAdoo's order, the Illinois inscription was retained on the scroll.
, in his book on commemoratives, speculated it might have been the Illinois Centennial Commission that had insisted on this.
![Walking Liberty Half Dollar 1945D Obverse](https://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/b/bc/Walking_Liberty_Half_Dollar_1945D_Obverse.png)
Later commentators have praised the coin. Taxay deemed the obverse "undoubtedly the finest work Morgan ever did in his forty-eight years with the Mint. The head is not merely well drawn, there is in it a depth of feeling, and introspective mood that almost makes the observer feel he is intruding on the great man." Writers on commemorative coins, including Arlie Slabaugh and David M. Bullowa, also admired the Illinois piece.
Q. David Bowers deemed Sinnock's reverse "the finest work he ever did for a legal tender coin", not excluding the
Roosevelt dime (1946) and
Franklin half dollar
The Franklin half dollar is a coin that was struck by the United States Mint from 1948 to 1963. The fifty-cent piece pictures Founding Father Benjamin Franklin on the obverse and the Liberty Bell on the reverse. A small eagle was placed to the ...
(1948, posthumous). Bowers noted that the border of both sides of the coin consists of beads and pellets, "an attractive substitute for denticles".
Art historian
Cornelius Vermeule
Cornelius Clarkson Vermeule III (August 10, 1925 – November 27, 2008) was an American scholar of ancient art and curator of classical art at the Museum of Fine Arts, Boston, from 1957 to 1996. He was also well known as a numismatist. He als ...
, in his 1971 book on the artistry of American coins and medals, wrote that "Morgan's interpretation has captured the restless plasticity of
'Connor'sbust, yet another indication of the benefits for coin design of good monumental models in sculpture". He noted of Sinnock's reverse, "the little burst of sun at the right is almost a bow to the Roty–Saint-Gaudens–Weinman developments outside the Philadelphia Mint in American numismatic taste and iconography in the generation following 1900. Sinnock's composition can be called conventional, but the entire aura of the coin reflects American art after the Civil War, and this is perhaps truly appropriate for the only
re-1954commemorative coin to honor Abraham Lincoln."
Production, distribution, and collecting
A total of 100,058 Illinois Centennial half dollars were struck at the Philadelphia Mint during August 1918, with the excess over the round number reserved for inspection and testing at the 1919 meeting of the annual
Assay Commission. There was no official packaging; a few were used in badges for the Illinois Centennial Commission. The coins were not publicized much outside Illinois. The centennial commission distributed them, at face value, to its county affiliates in proportion to their share of Illinois' population, on condition they be sold at a premium to help pay for local celebrations, and if one had already been held, for war relief.
The coins were also sold by the Springfield Chamber of Commerce at $1 each, though some were eventually vended for less: Texas coin dealer
B. Max Mehl
Benjamin Maximillian Mehl (November 5, 1884 – September 28, 1957), usually known as B. Max Mehl, was an American dealer in coins, selling them for over half a century. The most prominent dealer in the United States, through much of the first ...
purchased several thousand at just over
face value. A local bank held 30,000 of them for 15 years, and sold them during the
1933 Bank Holiday for a slight advance on par. This temporarily flooded the market, but they were absorbed during the first commemorative coin boom in 1936, though the price did not then rise from the $1.25 they had sold for since about 1925. At the height of the second commemorative coin boom in 1980,
uncirculated specimens sold for about $300. The edition of
R. S. Yeoman's ''
A Guide Book of United States Coins
''A Guide Book of United States Coins (The Official Red Book)'', first compiled by R. S. Yeoman in 1946, is a price guide for coin collectors of coins of the United States dollar, commonly known as the Red Book.
Along with its sister publicatio ...
'' published in 2017 lists the coin for between $130 and $685, depending on condition. An
exceptional specimen sold at auction in 2014 for $7,040.
References
Sources
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External links
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{{US commemorative coinage (1910s)
1918 establishments in the United States
Abraham Lincoln in art
Currencies introduced in 1918
Eagles on coins
Early United States commemorative coins
Fifty-cent coins
Monuments and memorials to Abraham Lincoln in the United States
Sculptures of presidents of the United States
Sun on coins
Symbols of Illinois