Twenty Cent Piece

The Twenty Cent Piece had one of the shortest mintages and lowest circulations in US coin history, for both the series and the denomination.

Specifications

 * Designer: William Barber
 * Obverse Design:
 * Reverse Design:
 * Edge: Plain
 * Weight: ±5.0 grams
 * Diameter: ±22 millimeters
 * Composition:  Silver (90%), Other (10%)
 * Dates Minted: 1875-1878

Background
The Twenty-Cent Piece of 1875-78 falls under the category of “what were they thinking?!” Despite having an official four-year existence, it was a circulation-issue coin for barely two years, which is a testament to the incredible failure of this odd coin denomination.

When it comes to the “what were they thinking” factor, it’s not so much that the powers-that-be felt a twenty-cent coin was needed: that notion did not come as far out of left field as it might seem. As far back as the late 1700's, our Founding Fathers (most notably, Thomas Jefferson) pushed for the idea of a U.S twenty-cent coin. During Colonial times, we were in fact USING a twenty-cent coin in the form of the two-reales coin of Spain – not Spanish America, but Spain– which was valued at the equivalent of twenty-cents in U.S. decimal-system money. The problem is, by the late 1800's, since there was already the five-cent, ten-cent and twenty-five cent coin, there was no longer any real need for a twenty-cent coin.

History
In 1874, Senator John P. Jones of Nevada, put forth a proposal for a new U.S. twenty-cent coin to be struck. Supposedly, the idea behind Mr. Jones' proposal was that twenty-cent coins were particularly needed in the West to facilitate coin transactions whereby citizens wouldn’t be short-changed in cases where items were still priced in Spanish units. In truth, many suspected Jones pushed for the twenty-cent coin because he was a friend to his state’s silver interests: the creation of a new silver coin would create more need for Nevada silver, especially since production of the standard-weight silver dollar (the lesser-weight Trade Dollar was in production at the time) was on hiatus during this period.

On March 3, 1875, President Ulysses S. Grant signed the law authorizing the Twenty-Cent Piece. Patterns for the new coin were immediately prepared. Now here’s where we REALLY get to the “what were they thinking” part of the story. Early on in the experimental coin designing process, officials had ALREADY vocalized their concerns that the new “double dime” (as the twenty-cent piece was often referred to) should have a design that could easily be distinguished from the already-circulating Seated Liberty quarter -–otherwise, it would cause much confusion amongst the general public. An 1874 pattern twenty-cent piece had an obverse design similar to that of the Trade dollar coin, with a seated Liberty figure facing completely to the left, and seated atop a globe. Another pattern had a distinctive Liberty head obverse. The reverse featured a right-facing eagle, also similar to the reverse design of the Trade dollar. With these attractive and easily distinguishable designs to choose from, Mint officials ended up choosing... a Seated Liberty obverse, identical to that of the Seated Liberty quarter!

In 1875, some 1.2 million new Twenty-Cent pieces were struck in the U.S. Mints of Philadelphia, San Francisco and Carson City. The San Francisco mint produced the lion’s share of 1875-dated Twenty-Cent piece coins, with 1,155,000 struck. The Philadelphia mint struck 39,700 Twenty-Cent pieces, and 133,290 were struck in Carson City.

The reaction of the coin-using public... instant confusion! People found in their change that year of 1875, that they had new Seated Liberty quarters.. and ANOTHER kind of new Seated quarter! This peculiar new “quarter” was slightly smaller, had a somewhat different-looking eagle on the reverse, and had a clear edge (instead of the usual reeded edge), but it still looked liked the old Seated Liberty quarter they’d been using for years! Of course, many people mistook the Twenty-Cent piece for a quarter. True, “Twenty Cents” was spelled out on the reverse, but apparently not too many bothered to take the time to read the reverse.

After 1875, it seems the verdict of the American public was either “why do we need a Twenty-Cent coin?” or “What? We have a Twenty-Cent coin??” U.S. mint and treasury officials soon saw what a debacle the new odd denomination had turned out to be. They quickly lost enthusiasm for Senator Jones’ pet coin. In 1876, the Philadelphia mint struck just under 16,000 Twenty-Cent pieces, while the Carson City mint struck only 10,000. In 1877 and 1878, only a few hundred special Proof issue “double dimes” were struck in each year. After that, the Twenty-Cent piece was given a quiet burial.

Collecting
The short life of the Twenty-Cent piece leaves the modern-day collector with a fascinating, odd coin to collect. The Twenty-Cent piece fascinates collectors today as an example of how completely a particular coin type can fail. Today’s collector saw a rough repeat of the Twenty-Cent coin blunder with the Susan B. Anthony dollar, which itself only last two years of circulation, (though it was strangely revived some 19 years later for a brief striking in the Fall of 1999). Still, though like the Twenty-Cent piece, the Susan B. Dollar was mistaken for a quarter, the case of mistaken identity had more to do with size. In the case of the Twenty-Cent piece, it resembled the currently-circulating Seated Liberty quarter in size AND design!

As the 1875-S easily had the highest mintage for the Twenty-Cent piece, it is the most affordable coin of this series today. It retails $85 in Good, but you won’t have much more to pay for a Fine example at $105, or a Very Fine at $135. Those are small jumps for much nicer–and scarcer– pieces! Strangely, the 1875, 1875-CC and 1876 dates had MUCH smaller mintages, but the prices are not radically higher than that of the far more common 1875-S. The 1875 retails $110 in Good; the 1875-CC retails $160 in Good; the 1876 retails $200 in Good. Those are not cheap, but should still be considered bargains for low mintage pieces of an already-scarce odd and short-lived coin type!

To complete Twenty-Cent piece date set is impossible for most collectors: the 1877 and 1878 Proof issues are so rare, that few collectors can obtain them. Most collectors simply try to obtain an 1875 and 1876 date– or simply one Twenty-Cent piece for a U.S. coin type set.

A couple of interesting postscripts to the Twenty-Cent piece. In 1878, the year this denomination was abolished, the Comstock mines of Nevada– located just outside of Carson City, with huge deposits underneath the “Las Vegas” of the 1800's, Virginia City, produced their largest output of silver ever, with some $36 million in silver coming out of the mines.

Also, bear in mind that Twenty-Cent pieces are scarce today not just because of their short life spans, low mintages, and losses due to attrition, but because between 1895 and 1954, it’s estimated that some 400,000 Twenty-Cent pieces were melted at the Philadelphia mint.

Mints

 * Philadelphia Mint (No mintmark)
 * Carson City Mint (CC mintmark)
 * San Francisco Mint (S mintmark)