State Quarters 1999-2008

The 50 States Commemorative Coin Program Act, Public Law 105-124, was approved on December 1, 1997. It gave the quarter a new reverse for each state over ten years starting in 1999, five states a year, taken in the order they ratified the Constitution or joined the Union. The Treasury Secretary picked each design after hearing from the state's governor and the Commission of Fine Arts. The law ruled out head-and-shoulders portraits, living people and anything frivolous.

The states ran their own selection. According to Wikipedia, governors made the final choice in 33 states and public votes decided the other 17. The Mint struck the first Delaware quarters at a ceremony in Philadelphia on December 7, 1998, and Hawaii closed the program in late 2008.

The Mint estimates that 147 million Americans collected the coins. It issued more than 34 billion state quarters to the Federal Reserve Banks and earned about $3 billion in seigniorage, and it calls the program the most successful coin initiative in U.S. history.

The eagle quarters of 1965-1998 are covered on the Washington clad quarter page. In 2009 the DC and U.S. Territories quarters followed, and the America the Beautiful quarters began in 2010.

Each year page lists that year's five coins in release order.

1999

Delaware (Caesar Rodney on horseback), Pennsylvania (the Commonwealth statue and a keystone), New Jersey (Washington crossing the Delaware), Georgia (a peach framed by live oak) and Connecticut (the Charter Oak).

2000

Massachusetts (the Minuteman), Maryland (the State House dome), South Carolina (palmetto, Carolina wren and jessamine), New Hampshire (the Old Man of the Mountain) and Virginia (the three Jamestown ships).

2001

New York (the Statue of Liberty), North Carolina (the Wright Flyer), Rhode Island (a sailboat on Narragansett Bay), Vermont (Camel's Hump and sap buckets) and Kentucky (a racehorse before Federal Hill).

2002

Tennessee (fiddle, trumpet and guitar), Ohio (an early airplane and an astronaut), Louisiana (pelican, trumpet and the Louisiana Purchase), Indiana (a race car) and Mississippi (magnolias).

2003

Illinois (young Lincoln), Alabama (Helen Keller, with her name in Braille), Maine (Pemaquid Point Light), Missouri (Lewis and Clark below the Gateway Arch) and Arkansas (a diamond, rice and a mallard).

2004

Michigan (the Great Lakes), Florida (a galleon and the Space Shuttle), Texas (a lone star in a lariat), Iowa (a schoolhouse after Grant Wood) and Wisconsin (a cow, cheese and corn).

2005

California (John Muir and Half Dome), Minnesota (a loon on a lake), Oregon (Crater Lake), Kansas (a bison and sunflowers) and West Virginia (the New River Gorge Bridge).

2006

Nevada (three mustangs), Nebraska (a covered wagon and Chimney Rock), Colorado (the Rockies), North Dakota (bison in the Badlands) and South Dakota (a pheasant over Mount Rushmore).

2007

Montana (a bison skull), Washington (a salmon and Mount Rainier), Idaho (a peregrine falcon), Wyoming (a bucking horse and rider) and Utah (the golden spike).

2008

Oklahoma (a scissor-tailed flycatcher), New Mexico (the Zia sun), Arizona (the Grand Canyon and a saguaro), Alaska (a grizzly with a salmon) and Hawaii (King Kamehameha I).

Obverse. To clear the reverse for the state designs, the Mint moved UNITED STATES OF AMERICA, QUARTER DOLLAR, LIBERTY and IN GOD WE TRUST to the front. CoinWeek credits William Cousins with the reworked Washington portrait, based on John Flanagan's. The date moved too: each reverse carries the year of issue beside the state's name.

Mint mark. It is on the obverse, right of Washington's ponytail and below IN GOD WE TRUST. On the eagle quarters it sat at the lower right, beside the neck. P means Philadelphia and D Denver, both for circulation. S means a San Francisco proof.

Clad or silver proof. Every year has two S proofs: a copper-nickel clad coin from the regular proof sets and a 90% silver coin from the silver proof sets, which began carrying state quarters in 1999. Look at the edge: clad coins show a copper stripe.

Satin finish. From 2005 the Mint's Uncirculated Coin Sets used a satin finish for the first time. So the 2005-2008 sets hold P and D state quarters with a soft, matte look, separate from coins struck for change. NGC gives 1,160,000 satin coins of each design for 2005, 847,361 for 2006, 895,628 for 2007 and 745,464 for 2008. These are not proofs, and earlier Mint set quarters were not satin.

2004-D Wisconsin Extra Leaf High and Extra Leaf Low. An extra leaf sticks out from the left of the corn stalk, steeply upward on the High and almost level on the Low. A Treasury Inspector General report, covered by Numismatic News in 2008, traced the High Leaf to one Denver press in November 2004. Its operator stopped the press, went to lunch and came back to find it striking again, and up to 50,000 coins went out. The report found no sign of intent and ruled out clashed dies. NGC's own note suggests a worker altered the dies, so the two views differ. No explanation was given for the Low Leaf. Most were found around Tucson and San Antonio.

2005-P Minnesota Extra Tree. Several Philadelphia reverse dies were doubled, leaving a faint extra spruce beside the third full tree right of the state outline. Specialists blamed tilted hubs, and PCGS labels the coins "Extra Tree" by die number. One die turned up on a satin-finish Mint set coin.

Delaware "spitting horse." A die crack runs from the horse's mouth on some 1999 Delaware quarters, and collectors report it on Denver coins too (search).

The mule. In May 2000 Frank Wallis of Arkansas found a coin struck with a state quarter obverse and a Sacagawea reverse on a golden dollar planchet. It has no date, and CoinWeek counts 19 known. See the Sacagawea mule page.

• Circulation, Mint set and clad proof coins: outer layers of 75% copper and 25% nickel bonded to a pure copper core, 91.67% copper and 8.33% nickel overall; 5.67 g; 24.26 mm; reeded edge.
• Silver proofs: 90% silver and 10% copper; 6.25 g; 24.26 mm; reeded edge; 0.1808 troy ounce of silver, as NGC gives it.

The satin coins are struck in the same clad metal as circulation quarters.