While the 2016 mintages for the America the Beautiful Quarters program had been released back in January, I've been a little lazy regarding updating this increasingly rarified blog. But I took the time to do the math yesterday so I figured I may as well get to it.
The idea behind this series of blog posts was me realizing the total mintage of these ATB quarters, while they will be in the billions upon billions, they will likely come nowhere near the total mintage of the State Quarters program which lasted from 1999-2009. The first three years especially were very low mintages from a late-20th/early-21st century standpoint. No year got as low as 1969's mintage, the current lowest production quarter (about 290 million pieces from both mints), but the ATB program did get off to a slow start from the deep recession that flushed the glut of State Quarters out of hiding, putting serious dents in 2009's and 2010's coin production. What I wanted to know was, when all was said and done, how would the two programs compare, not only to each other but to the previous clad eagle design (1965-1998) and as a whole?
Anyways, from where we last left off, 2015's ATB mintages were making some serious headway into the State Quarter's 2000 mintage which was also the largest single year State Quarter production.
The statistics were as follows:
Of the 2000 total: 44.8% with MA: 100% - MD: 100% - SC: 38.4% - NH: 0% - VA: 0%
To recap, the mintages from the 2000 State Quarters program were 3.67 billion quarters produced at the Philadelphia mint and 2.81 billion quarters produced at the Denver mint for a total mintage of 6,470.9 million quarters which broke down as follows:
Total mintage for Massachusetts was 1,163.8 million pieces
Total mintage for Maryland was 1,234.7 million pieces
Total mintage for South Carolina was 1,308.8 million pieces
Total mintage for New Hampshire was 1,169 million pieces
Total mintage for Virginia was 1,594.6 million pieces
The total mintage from both Philadelphia and Denver of the 2016 ATB quarters was approximately 2,356 million pieces, about 640 million less than 2015's mintage.
South Carolina's State Quarter has approximately 805.7 million pieces remaining in its mintage.
The first 2016 ATB quarter, Illinois's Shawnee National Forest, had a mintage of 307.4 million pieces which means South Carolina is still in the game with 61.9% of its mintage covered and 498.3 million quarters to go. Kentucky's Cumberland Gap National Historical Park quarter had a total mintage of 438.6 million pieces which comes close, but not quite surpassing South Carolina's mintage. 95.4% of its mintage is used up, leaving those 59.7 million quarters for the third ATB Quarter of the year, West Virginia's Harper's Ferry National Historical Park.
Harper's Ferry had the highest production total of the year with 858.6 million pieces. This easily wipes out South Carolina's mintage and then some (161% of South Carolina's mintage now), allowing us to move on to the fourth State Quarter of 2000, New Hampshire and its 1,169 million quarter production total. Taking the surplus from the previous design and subtracting it from New Hampshire's leaves the state with 370.1 million quarters to go and 68.3% of its total mintage used up for 2016's fourth ATB design.
The fourth 2016 ATB design was for North Dakota's Theodore Roosevelt National Park. Seeing T.R. on this design is a somewhat painful reminder that numismatists failed to persuade Congress to put Teddy Roosevelt's bust on the obverse of the coin as he is most associated with our national parks system. Alas, it'll be George Washington forever on our 25¢ coin...
Mintages for this coin were nearly half of Harper's Ferry, finishing out at 454.8 million pieces. However it was enough to completely cover the remaining New Hampshire mintage and then some...84.7 million some (107.2% of New Hampshire's mintage).
This brings us to the final 2016 ATB Quarter design, South Carolina's Fort Moultrie quarter (also known as the Fort Sumter National Monument). Its mintage was the smallest for the year at 296.6 million pieces which means Virginia's State Quarter mintage - the highest in that series - will live to see another year. Fort Moultrie's design plus the remainder of the Theodore Roosevelt National Park design eats into 23.9% of Virginia's mintage, leaving the state with another 1,213.3 million quarters for 2017. Seven years into the eleven year ATB Quarter program and we still have not exited the second year of the State Quarter program.
Barring any precipitous declines in mintages in 2017 (which does not seem likely), 2017's ATB Quarter totals should see us moving into the State Quarters' third year. We'll see...
In conclusion:
Of the 2000 total: 81.25% with MA: 100% - MD: 100% - SC: 100% - NH: 100% - VA: 23.9%
2016 dated quarters are:
Of total 1965-1998 quarter production (37,463 million pieces): 6.29%
Of total State Quarter production (1999-2009 : 35,451.2 million pieces): 6.65%
Of total clad quarter production (1965-2016): 2.85% [about 1 in 35 quarters will be dated 2016]
And of all quarters made from 1965-2016 (82,602.6 million pieces):
1965-1998 clad quarters make up 45.35% of the total [about 1 in 2 quarters; or to be more accurate, about 5 in 11]
State Quarters make up 42.91% of the total [about 1 in 2 quarters; or again, to be more accurate, about 3 in 7]
1999-dated quarters (4,430.8 million pieces) make up 5.36% of the total [about 1 in 19 quarters]
2000-dated quarters (6,470.9 million pieces) make up 7.83% of the total [about 1 in 13 quarters]
ATB Quarters from 2010-2016 (9,688.4 million pieces) make up 11.73% of the total [about 1 in 9 quarters; or more accurately, about 2 in 17 quarters will be an ATB design]
