for a statue of Lafayette, the French hero of the American Revolution.
The statue was dedicated at the Paris World's Fair of 1900. President
William McKinley chose Chicago businessman Ferdinand Peck as
commissioner-general for the American exhibit at the Paris exposition,
and Peck approved the monument for the exhibit. The coin was designed by
the Mint's Chief Engraver, Charles E. Barber, and features conjoined
busts of George Washington and Lafayette on the obverse. The images are
based on a sculpture of Washington by Jean-Antoine Houdon and a medal of
Lafayette by François-Augustin Caunois. The reverse depicts an early
sketch of the planned monument. All the coins were struck at the
Philadelphia Mint on December 14, 1899, the centennial of Washington's
death. They did not sell out, and 14,000 were later melted by the
Treasury. The coins are valued from several hundred dollars to tens of
thousands, depending on condition. The Lafayette dollar was the only
U.S. silver dollar commemorative prior to 1983, and the first U.S. coin
to depict an American citizen.
Read more: <https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Lafayette_dollar>
_______________________________
Today's selected anniversaries:
1800:
War of the Second Coalition: French forces under General Jean
Moreau defeated the Austrians and Bavarians under Archduke John in
Hohenlinden, near Munich, forcing the Austrians to sign an armistice.
<https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Battle_of_Hohenlinden>
1834:
The German Customs Union instituted the first regular census in
Germany.
<https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Census_in_Germany>
1927:
Putting Pants on Philip, the first official film featuring the
comedy duo Laurel and Hardy, was released.
<https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Laurel_and_Hardy>
1979:
Per the results of a two-day referendum, the current
Constitution of the Islamic Republic of Iran was adopted.
<https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Constitution_of_the_Islamic_Republic_of_Iran>
2009:
A suicide bombing in Mogadishu, Somalia, claimed the lives of
25 people, including three ministers of the Transitional Federal
Government.
<https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/2009_Hotel_Shamo_bombing>
_____________________________
Wiktionary's word of the day:
vacillation:
1. Indecision in speech or action.
2. Changing location by moving back and forth.
<https://en.wiktionary.org/wiki/vacillation>
___________________________
Wikiquote quote of the day:
The last word is not said, — probably shall never be said. Are
not our lives too short for that full utterance which through all our
stammerings is of course our only and abiding intention? I have given up
expecting those last words, whose ring, if they could only be
pronounced, would shake both heaven and earth. There is never time to
say our last word — the last word of our love, of our desire, faith,
remorse, submissions, revolt. The heaven and the earth must not be
shaken, I suppose — at least, not by us who know so many truths about
either. My last words about Jim shall be few. I affirm he had achieved
greatness; but the thing would be dwarfed in the telling, or rather in
the hearing. Frankly, it is not my words that I mistrust but your minds.
I could be eloquent were I not afraid you fellows had starved your
imaginations to feed your bodies. I do not mean to be offensive; it is
respectable to have no illusions — and safe — and profitable — and
dull. Yet you, too, in your time must have known the intensity of life,
that light of glamour created in the shock of trifles, as amazing as the
glow of sparks struck from a cold stone — and as short-lived, alas!
--Lord Jim
<https://en.wikiquote.org/wiki/Lord_Jim>
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