United States 1925-S half dollar KM-155

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1925-S half dollar, California jubilee

Authorization

San Francisco Citizen's Committee, chaired by future mayor Angelo J. Rossi, decided to commemorate 75 years of statehood with a specially designed half dollar. The proposal might have died aborning but for a similar measure undertaken on behalf of Vermont's Sesquicentennial that, fortunately, was endorsed by President Calvin Coolidge. The California coin became part of the Act of February 24, 1925, which not only included a coin for Vermont, but one commemorating the 100th anniversary of the founding of Fort Vancouver in the state of Washington. Groups in Los Angeles and San Francisco distributed the California halves for a dollar apiece, but 63,606 pieces remained unsold and were melted, leaving a net mintage of 86,394.

Obverse

Jo Mora (1876-1947)

The San Francisco Citizen's Committee asked noted local sculptor Jo Mora to design a coin that would capture the spirit of the state's diamond jubilee. Born in Uruguay in 1876, Mora had emigrated to California and was a popular artist living in Carmel. Fashioning both the obverse and rreverse of the coin, Mora sought to embody the essence of California during the 1850s. He employed two symbolic motifs: a "Gold Rush" prospector and a grizzly bear. Mora's artistic obverse design depicts a "Forty-Niner" panning for gold, with the inscriptions LIBERTY above, IN GOD WE TRUST to the left and CALIFORNIA DIAMOND JUBILEE and the date, 1925, below.

Reverse

The reverse features California's state emblem: a grizzly bear adapted from the flag used in the so-called Bear Flag Revolt of 1846. Above the bear is the motto E PLURIBUS UNUM, while below are the legends UNITED STATES OF AMERICA and HALF DOLLAR. Mora added an interesting touch to the design of the California half: the fields were left unpolished, appearing as boldly textured on the finished coin as they did on the sculptor's model.

Mintage

Authorized, 300,000 maximum; coined August 1-26, 1925, [150,000 + 20 assay] 63,606 melted, [Net 86,394] not including assay.

The Congressional Act authorizing the California Diamond Jubilee half dollar specified a maximum mintage of 300,000 coins, but only 150,200 coins were actually struck, with 200 pieces reserved for assay purposes. Production began at the San Francisco Mint on August 12, 1925, and that first day saw 100 special pieces struck at the request of Committee Chairman Rossi. These pieces are not true proofs, but rather are business strikes that have a bright, chrome-like surface, the result of being struck with polished dies. The S-mintmark appearing on all of the coins made at the western mint is on the lower reverse beneath the D in DOLLAR.

Specification: 192.9 grains = 12.50 grams; 0.900 fine silver, .36169 troy oz ASW, 30.61 mm (1.205 in) diameter, thickness: 2.15 mm (0.085 in), Edge: 150 reeds.

Catalog reference: KM 155.

Link to:

Source:

  • Breen, Walter H., Walter Breen's Complete Encyclopedia of U. S. and Colonial Coins, New York: Doubleday, 1987.
  • Slabaugh, Arlie R., United States Commemorative Coinage, 2nd Ed.," Racine, WI: Whitman Publishing, 1975.
  • Michael, Thomas, and Tracy L. Schmidt, Standard Catalog of World Coins, 1901-2000, 47th ed., Iola, WI: Krause Publications, 2019.
  • Yeoman, R. S., and Kenneth Bressett (ed.), A Guide Book of United States Coins, 65th Ed., Atlanta, GA: Whitman Publishing, 2011.

Gallery

  • The Serra Cenotaph - Jo Mora, Sculptor

  • California Diamond Jubilee Pin-Back Button -1925

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