Sacagawea & Native American Dollars 2000 to Date

The Susan B. Anthony dollar failed partly because it looked like a quarter. The United States $1 Coin Act of 1997 tried to fix that: the next dollar had to be golden in color, with a distinctive edge and features that made it easy to tell by sight and touch. Treasury Secretary Robert Rubin set up an advisory committee, which in June 1998 recommended Sacagawea, the Lemhi Shoshone interpreter and guide of the Lewis and Clark expedition.

Sculptor Glenna Goodacre's obverse shows her with her baby son, Jean Baptiste, on her back. No portrait of Sacagawea exists, so Goodacre used a modern Shoshone woman, Randy'L He-dow Teton, as her model. Mint sculptor-engraver Thomas D. Rogers Sr. designed the reverse: an eagle in flight inside a ring of 17 stars, one for each state when Lewis and Clark set out.

The coin went into circulation on January 27, 2000, backed by advertising and by deals with Walmart and General Mills. Philadelphia and Denver struck 1,286,056,000 dollars dated 2000. Demand faded fast; CoinWeek blames the Treasury's decision to keep printing the $1 note. Output fell to about 133 million the next year. CoinWeek notes that a Sacagawea dollar found in change today will most likely be dated 2000 or 2001.

The Native American $1 Coin Act, signed September 20, 2007, kept Goodacre's obverse and called for a new reverse each year honoring a Native American contribution. It also required that at least 20% of all dollar coins carry the Sacagawea design. The first new reverse, the Three Sisters, was released on January 17, 2009. After the Presidential dollars also failed to circulate, the Mint cut dollar production to what collectors buy, and dollars dated after 2011 have been made for numismatic sale (search).

Obverse. Sacagawea in three-quarter view, looking at the viewer, with LIBERTY above and IN GOD WE TRUST in the left field. Goodacre's GG is on the cloth wrapped around the baby. On 2000 to 2008 coins the date is at the lower right, with the mint mark centered below it.

Edge and mint mark. The 2000 to 2008 coins have a plain edge. From 2009 the date, mint mark and E PLURIBUS UNUM are incused on the edge, and the obverse has no date. PCGS calls a coin Position A when the edge lettering reads upside down with the obverse facing up, and Position B when it reads right side up. Coins that missed the lettering step have a blank edge and no date at all.

Reverses. 2000 to 2008: Rogers's flying eagle. From 2009, one design per year:

The reverse artist changes too. Leaving sculptors aside, NGC credits Norman E. Nemeth (2009), Thomas Cleveland (2010 and 2012), Richard Masters (2011), Susan Gamble (2013), Chris Costello (2014 and 2017), Ronald D. Sanders (2015) and Thomas D. Rogers Sr. (2016). CoinWeek credits Emily Damstra with the 2019 design.

Mint set coins. From 2005 to 2010 the dollars in the Mint's uncirculated sets have a satin finish. NGC lists them separately, labeled SMS, with their own mintages, such as 1,160,000 for each 2005 coin.

• 2000-P Cheerios: 5,500 coins placed in cereal boxes. Many have the prototype reverse with boldly detailed tail feathers.
• 2000-P Goodacre presentation: 5,000 coins with a special burnished finish, paid to the designer as her fee.
• 2000 Washington quarter mule: a state quarter obverse paired with the dollar reverse on a golden blank. CoinWeek counts 19 known.
• 2000-P Wounded Eagle: FS-901, a raised die line across the eagle's body.
• 2000-D Millennium set: a burnished Denver dollar sold with a 2000 Silver Eagle and a $1 note in 75,000 sets.
• VIP strikes: about 600 Philadelphia pieces made at a November 18, 1999 ceremony and 120 Denver pieces on February 25, 2000.
• 2000-dated gold strikes: 39 pieces in 22-karat gold, struck in 1999, reportedly at West Point. Twelve flew on Space Shuttle Columbia that July, and the rest were destroyed. The Mint sold some of the flown coins at auction in 2025; CoinWeek's two accounts give five and seven pieces.
• 2009 missing edge lettering: a dollar with a plain edge and no date anywhere.
• Collector-only finishes: Enhanced Uncirculated dollars from the coin and currency sets, 2014-D (50,000), 2015-W (88,805) and 2016-S (50,740), and the 2018-S reverse proof (199,116), with figures from USA Coin Book.
• Sacagawea and Presidential dollar mule: CoinWeek reports a single Denver coin from 2014 pairing the Sacagawea obverse with a Presidential dollar reverse. It sold at auction in April 2021.

The coin weighs 8.1 grams (NGC lists 8.07 g) and is 26.5 mm across, the same size as the Anthony dollar. The edge is plain through 2008 and lettered from 2009. There is no silver or gold in a circulating or proof golden dollar. Only the 1999 22-karat strikes and the 2025 anniversary coin were made in gold, and neither was a circulating coin.