Monaco coins of the 1950's, the French Riviera, and writer David Dodge

Monaco is a small principality located on the French Riviera and has been independent for a long time.

It mints it's own coins, and by agreement with France, uses French coin denominations and specifications.

In the 1950's Monaco was in the news for a number of reasons.

Coins of Monaco in the 1950's:


Monaco 10 francs 1950
Copper-aluminum, 20.0 mm, 3.0 gm


Monaco 20 francs 1950
Copper-aluminum, 23.5 mm, 4.0 gm


Monaco 50 francs 1950
Copper-aluminum, 27.0 mm, 8.2 gm


Monaco 100 francs 1950
Copper-nickel, 30.0 mm, 11.9 gm

David Dodge was an American writer in the 1940's and 1950's of mystery and adventure novels.

He was a San Francisco accountant and in 1941 he started writing four novels about a tough-guy accountant.
In 1942 he started working for the US Navy as an accountant at the Navy's San Francisco headquarters.

In 1945 he, his wife Elva, and daughter Kendal moved to Mexico and then Peru. He wrote three more novels about another tough-guy, this time set in Chile, Peru, and Bolivia.

In 1950 the United States allowed ordinary Americans to travel to Europe and Dodge's family moved to the French Riviera where he wrote his most famous novel, "To Catch a Thief", about a retired jewel thief who comes out of retirement to assist the police in catching another thief.

Dodge's novel mentioned several times the fall in value of the French franc which went from 38 francs to the US dollar in 1939 to 350 francs/dollar in 1950 and how this devaluation affected the characters in the book.

The book was filmed in 1954 on location in France and Monaco and starred Cary Grant and Grace Kelly.


Cary Grant flips an unidentified coin

Grace Kelly was introduced to Monaco's Prince Rainier before the filming began. In 1956 they were married.

The novel mentioned French police finding a French 10 franc coin in a room but the coin did not make it into the film.


France 10 francs 1951
Copper-aluminum, 20.0 mm, 3.0 gm

In 1956 France minted a smaller 100 franc coin:


France 100 francs 1956
Copper-nickel, 24.0 mm, 6.0 gm

Monaco minted a similar 100 franc coin:


Monaco 100 francs 1956
Copper-nickel, 24.0 mm, 6.0 gm

In 1959 the French franc was worth 500 to the US Dollar and France issued a "new franc" worth 100 "old francs" and Monaco followed:


Monaco 1 new franc 1960
Nickel, 24.0 mm, 6.0 gm


Monaco 5 new francs 1960
Silver, 29.0 mm, 12.0 gm