by a silver quarter
I give you a brief break from Gabriola rocks to tell you about curiosity and an unusual looking Canadian silver quarter which I found in the pile of change on husband’s dresser. On one side it has three figures that look like native petroglyphs, dated February 1999 Fevrier… and you know my love of petroglyphs.
Wikipedia tells me it is one of the Millenium quarters. This one is designed by Lonnie Springer and called ‘Etched in Stone”. No image was given there but I found one here and have borrowed it above. (My scan was lousy.)
This supposed-to-be-just-a-quick search then sent me looking into my archives for my posts about Writing-on-Stone Provincial Park in Alberta where we’d seen a few petroglyphs similar to these on the coin. I still want to go back there and see the others we missed!
See how I can get distracted and “waste time”? Not this time, I say, for I love these sudden little finds and connections, and how I’m reminded again about looking very closely even at supposedly ordinary coins. No, I’m not a coin collector though I’ve occasionally saved the odd special one, now including this one.
Back to spring cleaning – company’s coming!
May 21, 2011 in Being an Artist, Canada and BC, Rock Art & Archaeology by Marja-Leena
fascinating! i’ve stumbled upon a couple of interesting ones.
i’m good at wasting time doing interesting things like that when i’m supposed to be cleaning. wait, what was i doing? –
I do like Canadian money, and this one especially.
Dear little thing, isn’t it? Now go and spend it on something nice!
Elisa, let’s just say these distractions are the ‘coffee breaks’ amidst the cleaning, except one sometimes learns something interesting.
Zhoen, a touch of art on commerce, eh?
Lucy, not this little one, but there are many more ‘ordinary’ ones where it was found…. a contribution to parking meters or bus fares perhaps.
Yes, I’d keep that one! I’ve never seen that one in any of my Canadian change…
Marly, yes indeed, it’s a keeper especially with my interest and for reminding me of that Alberta trip. How lucky to spot this one…
It is a nice one as the engraving shows very well.
Do you remember when all Canadian coins from dimes and up were silver? The US switched to base metals in the 60’s and for a time afterward there was a fairly heavy traffic in Canadian coins heading south. When the government twigged ours were changed too. I thought that was sad and still do have some of the originals – and English ones too.
Ah yes, so easy to get lost in exploration.
Susan, yes, I remember, but not about the heavy traffic to the south! I should not have called this a silver quarter for it’s almost 100% nickel! Later ones are mostly steel. Really makes it worth hanging on to old coins, doesn’t it?