The Rhode Island Tercentenary half dollar (sometimes called the Providence, Rhode Island, Tercentenary half dollar) is a
commemorative fifty-cent piece struck by the
United States Bureau of the Mint in 1936. The coin was designed by
John Howard Benson John Howard Benson (July 6, 1901 – February 23, 1956) was an American calligrapher, stonecarver, incised letter designer, author, and educator.
Career
He was educated at Rogers High School, the National Academy of Design, and the Art Students ...
and Arthur Graham Carey. Its obverse depicts
Roger Williams, founder of the
Colony of Rhode Island and Providence Plantations. It was intended to honor the 300th anniversary of
Providence, Rhode Island
Providence is the capital and most populous city of the U.S. state of Rhode Island. One of the oldest cities in New England, it was founded in 1636 by Roger Williams, a Reformed Baptist theologian and religious exile from the Massachusetts ...
, although it bears no mention of the city.
Members of Rhode Island's congressional delegation sought a coin for the 300th anniversary of Providence, and Senator
Jesse Metcalf added authorization for one to a bill for another commemorative coin that had already passed the
United States 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 ...
. The amended bill was approved by both houses of
Congress
A congress is a formal meeting of the representatives of different countries, constituent states, organizations, trade unions, political parties, or other groups. The term originated in Late Middle English to denote an encounter (meeting of ...
, and it was signed by President
Franklin D. Roosevelt
Franklin Delano Roosevelt (; ; January 30, 1882April 12, 1945), often referred to by his initials FDR, was an American politician and attorney who served as the 32nd president of the United States from 1933 until his death in 1945. As the ...
. A total of 50,000 coins were struck at the three mints then in operation.
The coins went on sale on March 5, 1936, and the quantity made available to the public sold out in a matter of hours. Rhode Island insiders were holding back quantities for later sale once prices rose. That conduct incensed coin collectors, and the abuses led Congress to move toward banning commemorative coins. The coins are listed for hundreds of dollars today, depending on condition.
Background and legislation
Roger Williams was born in Britain around 1603. He was ordained as a minister, became a
Puritan
The Puritans were English Protestants in the 16th and 17th centuries who sought to purify the Church of England of Roman Catholic practices, maintaining that the Church of England had not been fully reformed and should become more Protestant. ...
, and moved to the
Massachusetts Bay Colony where he became the minister of the church in
Salem, Massachusetts
Salem ( ) is a historic coastal city in Essex County, Massachusetts, located on the North Shore of Greater Boston. Continuous settlement by Europeans began in 1626 with English colonists. Salem would become one of the most significant seaports tr ...
. Colonial authorities began to take issue with some of the teachings that he imparted to his congregation, such as the separation of church and state and fair dealings when purchasing land from American Indians. He was banished from the colony in 1635, and attempts were made to send him back to Europe. Instead, he escaped on foot and found refuge with
Massasoit
Massasoit Sachem () or Ousamequin (c. 15811661)"Native People" (page), "Massasoit (Ousamequin) Sachem" (section),''MayflowerFamilies.com'', web pag was the sachem or leader of the Wampanoag confederacy. ''Massasoit'' means ''Great Sachem''.
Mas ...
, sachem of the
Narragansett people
The Narragansett people are an Algonquian American Indian tribe from Rhode Island. Today, Narragansett people are enrolled in the federally recognized Narragansett Indian Tribe. They gained federal recognition in 1983.
The tribe was nearly la ...
. He bought a parcel of land from Massasoit in 1636 and established
Providence Plantations
Providence Plantations was the first permanent European American settlement in the Colony of Rhode Island and Providence Plantations. It was established by a group of colonists led by Roger Williams and Dr. John Clarke who left Massachusetts Bay ...
. Providence Plantations eventually merged with settlements on
Rhode Island
Rhode Island (, like ''road'') is a state in the New England region of the Northeastern United States. It is the smallest U.S. state by area and the seventh-least populous, with slightly fewer than 1.1 million residents as of 2020, but it ...
to form the
Colony of Rhode Island and Providence Plantations, which became the State of
Rhode Island
Rhode Island (, like ''road'') is a state in the New England region of the Northeastern United States. It is the smallest U.S. state by area and the seventh-least populous, with slightly fewer than 1.1 million residents as of 2020, but it ...
.
A committee was established in 1931 to mark the tercentenary of Williams' founding of Providence. 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 ...
claim in their volume on commemoratives that the moving forces behind the Rhode Island Tercentenary half dollar were Senators
Jesse H. Metcalf and
Peter Gerry and Representative
John Matthew O'Connell, all of whom applied political pressure to authorize the coin. In 1936, commemorative coins were not sold by the government. Congress usually designated an organization which had the exclusive right to purchase them at face value from the
United States Mint
The United States Mint is a bureau of the Department of the Treasury responsible for producing coinage for the United States to conduct its trade and commerce, as well as controlling the movement of bullion. It does not produce paper money; tha ...
and sell them to the public at a premium, and the Providence Tercentenary Commission was chartered for the Tercentenary coin.
A bill had passed the House of Representatives on April 3, 1935 for a
Hudson Sesquicentennial half dollar, and it had been recommended for passage in the Senate by the Committee on Banking and Currency. When the bill was considered in the Senate on April 15, Senator Metcalf moved to amend it to provide for a Providence Tercentenary half dollar to be issued, as well. There was no objection or debate, and the bill passed the Senate. It was then returned to the House of Representatives which agreed to the Senate amendments, and it was enacted on May 2 by the signature of President
Franklin D. Roosevelt
Franklin Delano Roosevelt (; ; January 30, 1882April 12, 1945), often referred to by his initials FDR, was an American politician and attorney who served as the 32nd president of the United States from 1933 until his death in 1945. As the ...
.
Preparation
John Howard Benson was one of the artists who designed the coin, and he wrote a letter to
Lee Lawrie of the
Commission of Fine Arts
The U.S. Commission of Fine Arts (CFA) is an independent agency of the federal government of the United States, and was established in 1910. The CFA has review (but not approval) authority over the "design and aesthetics" of all construction wit ...
on December 12, 1935 which provides information on the design process. Benson related that
Royal B. Farnum of the
Rhode Island School of Design
The Rhode Island School of Design (RISD , pronounced "Riz-D") is a private art and design school in Providence, Rhode Island. The school was founded as a coeducational institution in 1877 by Helen Adelia Rowe Metcalf, who sought to increase the ...
had assigned the coin design to him and Arthur Graham Carey because they had cut dies for small medals.
The Tercentenary Commission's coin committee originally proposed seven stars from an early version of Providence's seal for one side of the new coin, with the anchor from Rhode Island's seal and the state motto "Hope" on the other. Benson told Lawrie that the committee had then changed its mind, wanting to picture Roger Williams on the obverse side being greeted by Narragansetts, and they decided to open the design to a public competition. Benson and Carey persevered, made the changes, and entered the competition—and they were selected.
The Providence artist wrote that he was anxious to receive the opinion of the Fine Arts Commission. Lawrie forwarded the letter to Commission chairman
Charles Moore the same day, noting: "I don't know just what his troubles are. ... It won't make a great coin but the models are I think equal to some others we approved." The full Commission approved the designs on December 20, and reductions were made from plaster models to coin-sized
hubs were by the
Medallic Art Company
Medallic Art Company, Ltd. based in Dayton, Nevada was at one time "America’s oldest and largest private mint" and specialized in making academic awards, maces, medallions, along with chains of office and universities medals for schools. Af ...
of New York.
Design
The obverse is based on the seal of Providence showing Roger Williams kneeling in a canoe, his hand raised in signal of friendship. The Narragansett Indian who greets him has his hand extended, palm down, meant as a native sign for "good". Behind the Narragansett is a stalk of corn as a reference to the help and friendship which the Indians had shown to the
Mayflower Pilgrims
The Pilgrims, also known as the Pilgrim Fathers, were the English settlers who came to North America on the ''Mayflower'' and established the Plymouth Colony in what is today Plymouth, Massachusetts, named after the final departure port of Plymo ...
in establishing
Plymouth Colony
Plymouth Colony (sometimes Plimouth) was, from 1620 to 1691, the first permanent English colony in New England and the second permanent English colony in North America, after the Jamestown Colony. It was first settled by the passengers on the ...
. The Bible in Williams' other hand symbolizes the colonists' contribution to America. The Sun is rising in the background, symbolic of Rhode Island being the first colony where religious liberty was guaranteed. is the theme of the design and appears over their heads.
, , and the tercentenary dates surround the scene.
The reverse depicts the Anchor of Hope, taken from Rhode Island's state seal. The motto symbolizes the authority of the state government, while
evokes that of the federal government, as it is a national motto. The name of the country and the coin's denomination surround the reverse design.
Nowhere on the coin is the name of Providence, which was left off in the final alterations required by the Coin Committee. According to Swiatek, "this issue's obverse does not rate very high among collectors. The image of Roger Williams has the look of a robot from the old
Flash Gordon serial." The two designers later became partners in a stonecutting firm in
Newport, Rhode Island
Newport is an American seaside city on Aquidneck Island in Newport County, Rhode Island. It is located in Narragansett Bay, approximately southeast of Providence, south of Fall River, Massachusetts, south of Boston, and northeast of New Yor ...
, which accounts for the sculptural look of the coin, according to Swiatek. According to
Q. David Bowers, "no significant criticisms were ever mounted of the design". 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 ...
writes that the bands of lettering overwhelm the designs. "Roger Williams in his canoe looks like
Elpenor
In Greek mythology, Elpenor (; Ancient Greek: Ἐλπήνωρ, gen.: Ἐλπήνορος), also spelled Elpinor , was the youngest comrade of Odysseus. While on the island of Circe, he became drunk and decided to spend the night on the roof. In t ...
amid the bulrushes on a Greek vase of about 440 with a scene of the dialogue of Orpheus in the Underworld." He notes that "the Indian and Williams are blocked out with a childlike charm of conceptualism", but "the coat-of-arms is so simple as to defy analysis, or even comment."
Production, distribution, and collecting
A total of 20,000 half dollars arrived in Providence from 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 ...
by February 20, 1936; an additional 15,000 each were expected from the
Denver
Denver () is a consolidated city and county, the capital, and most populous city of the U.S. state of Colorado. Its population was 715,522 at the 2020 census, a 19.22% increase since 2010. It is the 19th-most populous city in the Unit ...
and
San Francisco Mints, but they had not been received. Those coins had been struck in January (Philadelphia and Denver) and February (San Francisco) 1936. In addition to the quantities sent to Providence, 13 pieces from Philadelphia, 10 from Denver, and 11 from San Francisco were held at Philadelphia for inspection and testing at the 1937 meeting of the
United States Assay Commission.
Swiatek and Breen noted, "March 5 proved to be a day of immense noise and confusion". The new coins went on sale through various Rhode Island banks amid considerable publicity at $1 per coin, with the Rhode Island Hospital National Bank taking the lead as depository. Out-of-staters could write to Grant's Hobby Shop in Providence, owned by Horace M. Grant, a well-known numismatist. Within hours of the coins going on sale, banks were allegedly out of them, and the issue was supposedly sold out within six hours. Yet ample supplies proved to be available at higher prices from insiders, including Horace Grant.
Low-mintage commemoratives were sometimes held back from sale by the distributor in anticipation of skyrocketing prices in those days, and Grant ran an advertisement in the April 1936 issue of ''
The Numismatist
''The Numismatist'' (formerly ''Numismatist'') is the monthly publication of the American Numismatic Association. ''The Numismatist'' contains articles written on such topics as coins, tokens, medals, paper money, and stock certificates. All mem ...
'' offering the coins for $7.50 per set of three by
mint mark
A mint mark is a letter, symbol or an inscription on a coin indicating the mint where the coin was produced. It should not be confused with a mintmaster mark which is the mark of the mintmaster.
History
Mint marks were first developed to locate ...
, or $2.75 individually. By June, he was offering to exchange the Rhode Island half dollars for other coins or sell them for $9 per set of three.
On June 24, the Tercentenary Commission announced that it would sell the first 100 from each mint in sets of three by matched numbers, by sealed-bid auction, but none of these sets has been identified.
There was widespread anger among coin collectors, and lawsuits were filed against the commission. Among those who litigated was Texas coin dealer L.W. Hoffecker, but he dropped the suit in exchange for 90 sets of three coins. In the years that followed, he complained to other dealers about the ethics of Grant and the Rhode Island officials. Hoffecker was influential in Congress and complained to Senator Metcalf about the situation. Metcalf suggested another act for another 50,000 coins, but Hoffecker advised against it unless some neutral party handled the distribution, lest they be hoarded. He complained that "every bank in Rhode Island is making a lot of money, instead of distributing the coins".
Congress ended the authorization for outstanding commemorative coin issues in 1939; the
Oregon Trail Memorial half dollar
The Oregon Trail Memorial half dollar was a fifty-cent piece struck intermittently by the United States Bureau of the Mint between 1926 and 1939. The coin was designed by Laura Gardin Fraser and James Earle Fraser, and commemorates those who ...
, for example, had been issued for over a decade. Hoffecker was elected president of the American Numismatic Association that same year, and he wrote to numismatist Walter P. Nichols in November expressing concerns about Grant's ethics. By then, the Rhode Island Tercentenary Committee had been dissolved, having shown a profit of $24,000 on the 50,000 coins issued. About two-thirds of that went towards a memorial to Roger Williams. The deluxe 2015 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 ...
'' (the Red Book) notes that the distribution of the coin "was wrapped in controversy—phony news releases reported that the coin was sold out when it was indeed not, and certain dealers procured large amounts at low prices only to resell for tidy profits."
By 1940, the price on the secondary market had dropped back to $4.50 per set of three, but it then rose steadily and reached $975 during the commemorative coin boom of 1980. The 2017 Red Book lists the coin between $325 and $675 per set of three, depending on condition, with single coins about a third of that. A near-pristine specimen from the San Francisco Mint sold at auction in 2014 for $6,463.
Notes
References
Sources
*
*
*
*
*
*
*
*
*
*
External links
*
{{Portal bar, Numismatics, Rhode Island, Visual arts
1936 establishments in the United States
Currencies introduced in 1936
Early United States commemorative coins
Fifty-cent coins
History of Rhode Island
Native Americans on coins
Ships on coins
Sun on coins
Tricentennial anniversaries