The 2005 Jefferson 5-cent coins will depict a new, one-year type portrait on the obverse and two new reverse designs, the first to be issued depicting a grazing bison, and the second, the view the Lewis and Clark Expedition members saw when they reached the Pacific Ocean.
The three designs for the 2005 5-cent coin, which will complete the Westward Journey Nickel Series, were unveiled Sept. 16 by U.S. Mint officials in Washington.
Treasury Secretary John W. Snow selected the final designs July 22, but Mint officials withheld disclosure until a special ceremony introducing the artists who produced the winning designs and the Mint sculptor-engravers assigned to execute the models.
The initials of each artist who created the original designs and each Mint engraver responsible for engraving the individual models will appear on the coins.
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Silver Spring, Md., artist Joe Fitzgerald, one of 18 professional master designers selected for the Mint's Artistic Infusion Program (AIP), contributed two of the three designs picked.
Fitzgerald's enlarged profile right of Jefferson, based on a Jean-Antoine Houdon bust of the third president, was one of two final designs he submitted that made it to the final six obverses. The other, unselected obverse shows a fuller view of Jefferson based on the same sculpture.
Fitzgerald's initials, JF, appear on the obverse design along with those of Mint Sculptor-Engraver Don Everhart II (DE).
Snow also selected Fitzgerald's reverse design for the second 2005 5-cent coin, which exhibits a view of the Pacific Ocean as the members of Lewis and Clark's Corps of Discovery would have seen it upon reaching the coast. Fitzgerald's initials appear on the plaster model along with those of Mint Sculptor-Engraver Donna Weaver (DW).
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Fitzgerald's reverse design feature Capt. William Clark's journal entry of the joy expedition members felt seeing the Pacific Ocean. However, Clark's spelling of the word "Ocian" was changed to "Ocean."
The reverse design selected by Snow for the reverse of the first 2005 Jefferson 5-cent coin is the work of AIP artist Jamie N. Franki, a professional illustrator and professor from Concord, N.C. The Grazing Buffalo design features a bison facing right and grazing.
Franki's initials, JNF, appear on the plaster models along with those of Mint Sculptor-Engraver Norman E. Nemeth, who modeled the design.
The 5-cent coins are being issued under provisions of the American 5-Cent Coin Continuity Act of 2003. The designs for the 2006 and future 5-cent coins, to exhibit another new portrait of Jefferson and new rendition of his Virginia home, Monticello, are scheduled to be reviewed Sept. 21 in separate sessions by the Commission of Fine Arts and Citizens Coinage Advisory Committee.
More details on the 2005 selections will be published in the Oct. 4 print and online edition of Coin World.
