PCGS - When the United States Mint announced in 1999 that it would re-release the long-dormant
Susan B. Anthony dollar after a nearly 20-year hiatus, it stunned many in the numismatic hobby. The "Susie B.," which proved to be a massive failure during its original 1979-1981 run, had gained traction on the transit and vending machine scene as an efficient way to pay for transactions. As prices increased during the mid-1980s and throughout the 1990s for subway fares, pricy snacks, and stamps, small change such as nickels and dimes became more cumbersome in paying for goods and services purchased by way of pushing silver-colored coinage through a change slot.
Susan B. Anthony dollar, 1999-P SBA$1, DCAM, PCGS PR70DCAMBy the time the late '90s had rolled around, the large stockpiles of
Susan B. Anthony dollars that languished in federal vaults and bank safes since the early 1980s had dwindled to fewer than 50 million coins - a mere fraction of the half billion that the United States government had on hand 15 years earlier. The United States Mint was preparing to launch the
Sacagawea dollar in 2000, a golden-colored base-alloy coin featuring a visage of the young Shoshone woman who helped guide the Lewis and Clark Expedition to the Pacific Northwest in the early 1800s. But, unfortunately, supplies of the
Susan B. Anthony dollar were being depleted faster by 1999 than could be replenished by the long-anticipated
Sacagawea dollar slated for release the following year.
On May 20, 1999, Director of the United States Mint Philip Diehl made the startling announcement that the
Susan B. Anthony dollar was on its way to unexpected encore. "Demand for dollar coins is growing as more mass-transit authorities and vending operations convert to using the dollar coin," he said. "As a result, we're likely to exhaust current supplies of
SBA dollars before the new dollar coin is available in January. We're committed to providing an uninterrupted supply of dollar coins through this transition."
Ultimately, the United States Mint pumped out some 42 million
Susan B. Anthony dollars in 1999, including 29,592,000 from the Philadelphia Mint, 11,776,000 hailing from Denver, and a maximum of 750,000 proofs made in Philly; the 1999-P Proof Dollar production represents the lowest mintage figure for the series. While most of the 1999-P and 1999-D business-strike SBAs were made available for channels of commerce to supply the economy with any new dollar coins it needed, a number of the circulation strikes and the 1999-P proofs were offered to coin collectors through the United States Mint website and product catalog.
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Posted 12/30/2020 11:17 pm
