That’s why the 1944 Dime earned retroactive interest from collectors. The Mercury Dime had been minted from 1915 to 1945 so it could legally be redesigned without killing time in Congress. But the public loved it, and people call it one of the prettiest US coins ever! The mint had no plans to stop coining this dime.īut when FDR died late in 1945, they had to quickly place him on a coin. This meant it needed additional strikes to render clearly, so it used up dies faster and cost the mint more money in production expenses. The Mint wasn’t especially happy with the Mercury Dime because it had a lot of details and high relief.

But his trainees and assistants still worked on later coins for the US Mint. Weinman had been a student of Augustus Saint-Gaudens, who designed the $10 and $20 gold coins and clashed with Barber a lot. He won a coin contest to replace the previous Barber Dime designed by the Chief Mint Engraver, Charles Barber. Stevens wore a stocking on her head to simulate the appearance of a Phrygian cap. The couple rented rooms above the coin artist’s apartment, and he explains that Mrs. The model’s identity wasn’t public at first, but her family later admitted it.

The portrait of Winged Lady Liberty was based on Elsie Stevens, the wife of a famous poet and lawyer named Wallace Stevens. The feathers made the hat look like Mercury’s winged helmet. It was officially called the Winged Liberty Dime, but people mistook Miss Liberty for the Roman god Mercury due to the wings on her Phrygian cap. But in 1944, the Dime in use was the Mercury Dime. Today’s Roosevelt Dime was introduced in 1946 to honor the recent death of FDR, the 32 nd US President.

This has happened to lots of silver coins when spot prices spiked. Basically, if the coin was larger, it would be more valuable in its molten form, tempting people to melt it for profit. Because of its high silver content, the physical size of the coin stayed small to ensure its melt value didn’t exceed its face value. The Dime is a 10-cent American coin introduced in 1792. Let’s find out more as we explore the 1944 Dime Value and history. But the dime was already 90% silver until 1965 so its composition didn’t shift. The military needed nickel and copper, so pennies and nickels were adjusted accordingly, swapping out their base metals for silver and steel. From 1942 to 1945, many American coins were changed to aid the War Effort.

1942 mercury dime double date