Washington Quarter

History

Congress authorized the Washington quarter by the Act of March 4, 1931, empowering the Treasury Secretary to change the quarter dollar design for issue beginning in 1932, the bicentennial of Washington's birth. Special legislation was required because the Standing Liberty quarter had run only 14 years, short of the 25-year term the Mint Act of September 26, 1890 set before the Secretary could act alone. The bust was first proposed for the half dollar, but with Depression conditions halting half dollar and silver dollar production from 1931 through 1933, Congress redirected the portrait to the 25-cent piece as a continuing coinage rather than a one-year commemorative. A 1931 competition drew multiple sculptors, all required to model Washington after the bust Jean-Antoine Houdon took from a life mask at Mount Vernon in 1785; the Commission of Fine Arts twice named Laura Gardin Fraser the winner, but Treasury Secretary Andrew W. Mellon, the final judge, selected John Flanagan's left-facing portrait instead. Fraser's obverse eventually reached coinage on the 1999 $5 gold commemorative and on the American Women Quarters beginning in 2022.

Details

Flanagan designed both sides, and the coins of the 1932-1964 run were struck in 90% silver and 10% copper at 24.3 mm with a reeded edge. The standard weight is 6.25 grams, or 96.45 grains, though PCGS lists the silver-era dates at 6.30 grams. Philadelphia struck no mint mark in this period, while Denver used D and San Francisco used S. Production began at Philadelphia in July 1932 and at Denver and San Francisco that September, with the coins reaching circulation on August 1, 1932; the first-year totals were 5,404,000 at Philadelphia, 436,800 at Denver and 408,000 at San Francisco, for 6,248,800 in all. Quarter coinage was suspended in 1933 and resumed in 1934, after which the type ran unbroken through 1964, when rising silver prices brought the shift to copper-nickel clad the following year.

Features

Washington's head faces left after the Houdon bust, with LIBERTY across the upper field, IN GOD WE TRUST below the chin and the date at the bottom. Flanagan's version departs from the marble in head shape and adds several curls not present on the original. The reverse carries a modernistic eagle with outstretched wings and head turned left, perched on a bundle of arrows above two intertwined olive branches, with E PLURIBUS UNUM above, UNITED STATES OF AMERICA around the top border and QUARTER DOLLAR spelled out at six o'clock; no restrictions were placed on the sculptors for this side. Through 1964 the mint mark sits on the reverse, centered between the two olive branch stems below the wreath. Doubled dies are the principal variety class, sometimes several to a single date, and PCGS separately recognizes the Type B reverse under FS-901, listing 1963 alone with FS-101, FS-102, FS-103 and FS-901.

Notable facts

• The 1932-S at 408,000 pieces is the lowest circulation mintage in the entire Washington quarter series, with the 1932-D at 436,800 close behind, and both fall under the 484,000 struck for the 1909-S VDB Lincoln cent.
• Neither 1932 branch-mint issue was intended as a rarity; regional banks simply needed few new coins, and the 1932-D could still be ordered from the Treasury at face value plus postage as late as 1934.
• The two dates are about equally available in circulated grades, but far more 1932-S than 1932-D were set aside, leaving the Denver coin the greater condition rarity.
• PCGS estimates roughly a 10% survival rate for the 1932-S, on the order of 40,000 coins in all grades, and has graded just over 100 examples of the 1932-D in MS65 against nearly 200 of the 1932-S.
• The 1964-D reached 704 million pieces, more than five times the 135 million of the next-largest non-1964 issue, the 1963-D, yet it is scarcer in Gem than several S-mint dates of the 1940s and 1950s.
• Stack's Bowers records a proof mintage of 19,911,592 for the 1932-1964 type, and PCGS applies a Prooflike designation to some business strikes rather than any full-strike qualifier.