Celebrating the penny as U.S. Mint ends manufacturing : NPR

[ad_1] <img src="https://npr.brightspotcdn.com/dims3/default/strip/false/crop/4162x2711+0+0/resize/1100/quality/50/format/jpeg/?url=http%3A%2F%2Fnpr-brightspot.s3.amazonaws.com%2F01%2F1e%2Fa8a9fa564301bcff16fac3c02225%2Fgettyimages-2245829943.jpg" data-template="https://npr.brightspotcdn.com/dims3/default/strip/false/crop/4162x2711+0+0/resize/{width}/quality/{quality}/format/{format}/?url=http%3A%2F%2Fnpr-brightspot.s3.amazonaws.com%2F01%2F1e%2Fa8a9fa564301bcff16fac3c02225%2Fgettyimages-2245829943.jpg" class="img" alt="A stray penny sits next to machinery at the U.S. Mint in Philadelphia, where the final one rolled off the presses last week." fetchpriority="high"/> Farewell, candy penny. The final of you was minted final week, however you'll by no means stray removed from our ideas and aphorisms. Matthew Hatcher/Getty Photographs disguise caption

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Matthew Hatcher/Getty Photographs Alas, pricey penny, you served us nicely.

We picked you up, you gave us luck.

We gave you to others in change for his or her ideas.

And keep in mind after we contemplated whether or not dropping you from the Empire State Constructing might kill a pedestrian? That was enjoyable. (Extra on that later.)

Now you might be useless — however not gone (extra on that later, too) — on the wizened age of 232. When polished, you look as younger as whenever you had been first minted, however you might be price much less to us now, and we have moved on to better bills. The nation as soon as used you to pay Union troopers within the Civil Conflict; now, you barely purchase a gumball (and solely in bulk!).

Like practically all People, you descended from an immigrant, the British penny. These cash had been as soon as so invaluable that they had been cut up into halves and even quarters — your late British cousins, the halfpenny and the farthing. In Britain, the coin's historical past goes again to the time when kings and queens had names like Offa and Cynethryth and Aethelred the Unready, and your title probably traces its lineage from the German for pan — pfanne, for pan, which advanced to pfennig, for penny.

The primary one-cent coin in america rolled off a non-public mint in 1787 and wasn't known as a penny. It was the fugio cent — fugio for "fly away" in Latin, signifying time flies. The 100% copper coin was inscribed with the shocking phrases, "thoughts your enterprise," extra a tackle "penny smart, pound silly" than an admonition in opposition to nosiness.

<img src="https://npr.brightspotcdn.com/dims3/default/strip/false/crop/2100x2826+0+0/resize/1100/quality/50/format/jpeg/?url=http%3A%2F%2Fnpr-brightspot.s3.amazonaws.com%2Fdb%2F75%2Fce86115543d497ef993e70eac221%2Fgettyimages-3277719.jpg" data-template="https://npr.brightspotcdn.com/dims3/default/strip/false/crop/2100x2826+0+0/resize/{width}/quality/{quality}/format/{format}/?url=http%3A%2F%2Fnpr-brightspot.s3.amazonaws.com%2Fdb%2F75%2Fce86115543d497ef993e70eac221%2Fgettyimages-3277719.jpg" class="img" alt="A black-and-white photo of a child pondering a variety of gum-ball machines options on a sunny street." loading="lazy"/> A toddler might purchase bubble gum for a penny in 1975. You'd have to purchase in bulk to get that fee at this time. Peter Keegan/Keystone/Getty Photographs disguise caption

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Peter Keegan/Keystone/Getty Photographs The U.S. minted its first official penny in 1793. Abraham Lincoln was pictured on the coin beginning in 1909, to honor the centennial of his beginning, the primary time a president's picture graced U.S. forex. The phrases "In God We Belief" had been added on the similar time. Ever the trailblazer, you, the common-or-garden penny, had been the primary to hold these phrases earlier than Congress added it to all forex and made it the nationwide motto virtually a half-century later.

Now, at simply 2.5% copper and the remainder zinc, you possibly can't even beat the price of your personal manufacturing, in keeping with the U.S. Mint, which says it took 3.69 of you to make just one extra in 2024.

Though we will not meet any new pennies, we all know you'll cling round for one more 30 years or so, as a result of that is the standard lifespan of a coin, in keeping with the U.S. Treasury.

So, fortunately for us, we'll nonetheless have the proper cash to place in our penny loafers within the 2050s, after we can count on them to cycle again in type. (Within the Thirties, younger folks put cash of their sneakers for emergency pay cellphone calls, and thus the Weejun was born. Possibly somebody will design a classy cellphone shoe earlier than the penny disappears?)

In the meantime, you reside on in different methods. We'll most actually have a good time you aphoristically, and that is the place the penny drops. We'll all the time be in for a penny, in for a pound. We'll proudly commerce pennies for ideas whereas persevering with to present our personal two cents' price. We'll nonetheless pinch you, as a result of a penny saved is, as ever, a penny earned. We'll put a shiny penny in a bride's shoe for luck.

James Geary, creator of The World in a Phrase: A Temporary Historical past of the Aphorism, says the penny is the proper coin for these little pearls of knowledge.

"The penny lends itself to aphorisms as a result of they're each small — the aphorism is the shortest type of literature, and the penny is the smallest financial denomination," Geary says.

Sure, you might be small however mighty. But we'll by no means kill something with you, from the Empire State or some other tall constructing. Your dimensions — three-quarters of an inch thick and weighing lower than a tenth of an oz. — are higher suited to flipping and fluttering within the air than reaching deadly velocity.

Because the Mythbusters demonstrated, the penny-drop fantasy is not price a dime. However, at 10 cents, the dime is at the very least worthwhile to mint.