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Message:: [QUOTE="johnmilton, post: 4345515, member: 101855"]Greetings fellow shut-ins! My wife is really depressed. Easter is usually the time when the family got together. Not this year. My father in law is locked down in a retirement facility, and everyone else is at home. So it's time for another archives articel.       November 22, 1963, “A day that will live in infamy.” For many Americans that phrase, which President Franklin D. Roosevelt used to describe the Japanese attack on Pearl Harbor in 1941, aptly applied to the assassination of President John F. Kennedy. In the wake of that awful event, streets and boulevards were renamed, state and federal buildings were rededicated and even Cape Canaveral was briefly changed to Cape Kennedy. Of equal significance was a change in our nation’s coinage that would have a profound effect upon the half dollar as circulating coin.       Plans for a new Kennedy coin were in the works only days after the assassination. By November 27 it had been determined that a Kennedy design would replace the Benjamin Franklin half dollar. Government officials considered changing the design of the quarter, half dollar or silver dollar, but the half dollar was chosen in part because Mrs. Jacqueline Kennedy opposed displacing the Washington Quarter.       The Franklin Half Dollar had been in production for only 16 years, which met that it took an act of Congress to change the design. According to the statutes coin designs could be changed by the order of the Treasury without congressional authorization after 25 years. Although Congress had not passed the required legislation, chief mint engraver, Gilroy Roberts, and assistant engraver, Frank Gasparro, set to work on the new coin. Roberts would design the obverse and Gasparro was assigned to do the reverse. [ATTACH=full]1100387[/ATTACH] [ATTACH=full]1100388[/ATTACH] The 1961 Presidential Medal in Silver.       Both men faced a formidable task. In the days before computer generated coin designs and program driven laser die production techniques, Roberts and Gasparro had to complete what had been several months’ work in four weeks. To streamline the project, they decided to use design elements from the 1961 Kennedy presidential medal. The bust of the president, without a coat and tie, appeared on the obverse and the presidential seal, which featured a heraldic eagle, dominated the reverse.       By mid December Roberts and Gasparro had produced intermediate sized 5 inch models of the coin and trial strikes of the piece were produced shortly there after. Upon reviewing the designs, Mrs. Kennedy was favorably impressed, but she commented that part of the hair should have been less pronounced while other areas needed more accents.      Roberts made the changes to the 5 inch model, but not before a few Proof coin dies had been created with the original design. About 3% of the 1964 Proof Kennedy half dollars display this original artwork which collectors call the “accented hair variety.” These unusual half dollars were the first to be struck when Proof coin production began on January 2, 1964. [ATTACH=full]1100389[/ATTACH] The 1964 Proof Accented Hair variety of the JFK half dollar. Sorry, but I don't have a great photo of this.       By the end January the Denver mint began to produce business strike Kennedy half dollars. The following week the Philadelphia mint was on line. The demand for new coins was brisk as many citizens wanted them as keepsakes. Despite the fact that both mints ran overtime to produce a record number of almost 430 million 1964 half dollars, the coins were almost never seen in circulation. [ATTACH=full]1100391[/ATTACH] [ATTACH=full]1100392[/ATTACH] The 1964-D JFK half had the mint mark on the reverse for the only time. I think that this coin is kind of neat, but most collectors are not that interested in it.       The Philadelphia mint also produced a record number of almost 4 million Proof sets. Many of these sets went to non-collectors who in some instances cut out the half dollar and spent the other coins. One coin dealer I knew in Philadelphia told me he was finding Proof dimes and quarters in change.      Demand for the 1964 Proof sets was strong. At one point the retail price reached $35.00 which was a very high price for a new Proof set at that time. Some dealers quietly warned their clients that the prices would come down, but demand remained strong for several months.      As the year continued banks and businesses began to experience shortages of coins in circulation. These shortages extended beyond the new half dollars to dimes, quarters and even cents and nickels. Treasury officials were quick to blame coin collectors. At first they urged collectors to stop taking coins from circulation, and then they began to threatened sanctions against collectors and dealers. Nevada senator Alan Bible introduced a bill in Congress that would have seriously crippled the coin collecting hobby. Fortunately cooler heads prevailed and the measure never came up for a vote.      The real culprits for the coin shortage were speculators who perceived that the price of silver was going to rise above $1.29 an ounce. At that level the melt value of every dime, quarter and half dollar would exceed its face value. The speculators’ prognostications about the price of silver would prove to be true, but it would be a few years before those predictions became reality.      In response treasury officials initiated actions that they hoped would discourage coin collectors. The dates were frozen on all coins, and mint marks were dropped as well. The mint also suspended the production of Proof coins. In the mean time Congress passed legislation that would change the nation’s coinage forever. [ATTACH=full]1100396[/ATTACH] [ATTACH=full]1100397[/ATTACH] The 1965 Special Mint Set had only one silver coin, the 40% silver clad 1965 Kennedy Half Dollar.       The Coinage Act of 1965 removed all of the silver from the dime and quarter and reduced silver content of the half dollar from 90% to 40%. The new silver clad half dollar had obverse and reverse layers that were composed of 80% silver and 20% copper that were bonded to core of 80% copper and 20% silver. This unusual alloy was a compromise to the congressional delegations from the mining states to maintain the traditional government presence in the silver market.     By 1965 mint was still producing 90% silver coins dated 1964, and clad coins that bore the current year’s date. The anti-collector mood had eased a bit at the mint as the system began to produce the Special Mint Sets. The Special Mint Set coins were inferior to the coins in the old Proof sets, and contained only one silver coin. Yet the price was raised from $2.10 to $4.00. Despite that fact that these sets were struck at the recently reopened San Francisco mint, they did not have the familiar and popular “S” mint mark.      By 1966 treasury officials had lifted the date freeze, and coinage operations were starting to get back to normal. Still more changes lay ahead for the Kennedy half dollar, which would continue to be a source of interest and speculation to many in the general public. More to come tomorrow or the next day.  [/QUOTE]

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