Colorado quarters are off and rolling

Ceremonial Colorado quarters were stamped this morning, formally making the Centennial State the 38th to have its own quarter.

Gov. Bill Owens started the pressing machine at the Mint in Denver to create the coin that depicts a mountain range over a banner that reads “Colorful Colorado.”

The design does not represent a real mountain, but represents what people think about Colorado, said First Lady Frances Owens.

“We would need about 10 quarters,” Frances Owens said about showing all the good things about Colorado.

About 1,500 people sent in design submissions for two years. The other four final designs considered for the coin were cliff dwellings at Mesa Verde National Park, a soldier/skier if the 10th Mountain Division, the Rocky Mountains and Pikes Peak.

The Denver and Philadelphia Mints will produce between 575 million to 650 million Colorado quarters, said Timothy Riley, plant manager for the Denver Mint. About 100 million of the quarters have been produced since May 8.

The coins will be released to the public on June 14.

Colorado’s quarter is part of the Fifty States Commemorative Coin Program Act passed by Congress in 1997. Each year, five state coins are produced in the order of statehood. Colorado became a state on Aug. 1, 1876.

(via Rocky Mountain News)