Walking Liberty Half Dollar - Replacement and Design Reuse

Replacement and Design Reuse

In 1947, Mint Director Nellie Tayloe Ross asked Engraver Sinnock to produce a design for a half dollar featuring Founding Father Benjamin Franklin. Ross had long been an admirer of Franklin, and wanted to see him on a coin. Mint officials had considered putting Franklin on the dime in 1941, but the project was shelved owing to heavy demands on the Mint for coins as the United States entered World War II. During the war, the Mint contemplated adding one or more new denominations of coinage; Sinnock prepared a Franklin design in anticipation of a new issue, which did not occur. In 1946, the Treasury replaced the Mercury dime with a piece depicting the recently deceased president, Franklin Roosevelt, who had been closely associated with the March of Dimes. With the Lincoln cent popular and politically inexpedient to replace, the half dollar was the only piece being struck which was available for redesign without congressional permission. The Treasury approved the new design. Although Sinnock died before the coin was issued, the Franklin half dollar went into production at the start of 1948, ending the Walking Liberty series. A total of 485,320,340 Walking Liberty half dollars were struck.

Since 1986, Weinman's obverse design has been used as the obverse design for the American Silver Eagle bullion coin. In adapting the design, Mint Sculptor-Engraver John Mercanti and other members of the engraving staff strengthened many of the details. Mercanti noted that Weinman's original plaster was only 6 inches (150 mm) in diameter, and was softly modelled. Mercanti increased the detail so that the design, struck on a larger coin, would be bolder and would have a more even metal flow when struck than Weinman's original coin. Treasury Secretary James Baker chose a heraldic eagle design, by Mercanti, as the reverse of the American Silver Eagle.

In December 2010, President Barack Obama signed legislation authorizing bullion coins made of palladium. The obverse would be taken from the Mercury dime; the reverse would follow Weinman's architectural award medal on which he based the half dollar's reverse. The Mint was directed to obtain an independent study of whether there would be enough market demand to justify the issuance of the piece; it voided its first contract for such a study on learning that the contracted firm had ties to the palladium industry. The contract was re-awarded to New York-based CPM Group, which conducted the necessary research between May and July, 2012.