Kennedy Half Dollar

Posted on: November 17, 2011

Both Congress and the U.S. Mint scrambled to create the coin memorializing our nation’s 35th President following President Kennedy’s assassination on November 22, 1963. Under existing law, coin designs could not be changed more often than every 25 years, and the Franklin-Liberty Bell Half-Dollar had only been minted for 15 years. Committed to minting the Kennedy Half-Dollar for the new year, Congress passed an act authorizing the Kennedy Half-Dollar on December 30, 1963.