Peace Dollar: The Story of America's Last Silver Dollar (1921–1935)

The Peace Dollar ran as a circulating coin for fifteen years — 1921 through 1935, with a three-year gap in the middle — before Depression-era economics ended production. Struck to mark the end of the First World War and designed by a sculptor whose own wife served as the model for Liberty, it was the last 90%-silver business-strike dollar issued by the United States. The series returned in 2021 as a collector-only program at the San Francisco and Philadelphia mints, now struck in .999 fine silver, and continues annually today.

This guide covers the design competition that created it, the two distinct relief types, the production history across three separate coinage runs, the three key dates every collector needs to know, the aborted 1965 reissue that almost added a fourth coinage era, and the modern 2021-present program. Value tables for the three catalog coins — the 1921, the 1928, and the 1934-S — appear in their respective sections.

Origin: the 1921 design competition and Teresa de Francisci

The Pittman Act of 1918 required the Treasury to replace millions of melted silver dollars with newly struck coins. The Morgan Dollar, already decades old, had been filling that role, but by late 1921 there was political appetite for a new design that reflected the war's end. Treasury Secretary Andrew Mellon authorized a competition among eight sculptors, setting a tight December 1921 deadline.

The winner was Anthony de Francisci, a 34-year-old Sicilian-born sculptor. His Liberty wears a radiate crown suggesting both the classical sun and — intentionally — the Statue of Liberty. The model for her face was his wife, Teresa Cafarelli de Francisci, a recent Italian immigrant. The reverse shows a bald eagle at rest on a mountain crag, the word PEACE inscribed on the rock below — the first explicit peace message on a circulating US coin.

The Pittman Act connection matters for understanding why Peace Dollars exist at all: the law mandated that an equivalent number of silver dollars be coined to replace every dollar melted down during the war, tying dollar production to bullion-coverage requirements rather than purely to commercial demand. Without it, the series might never have launched.

Two design types: 1921 high relief vs. 1922-onward low relief

The 1921 Peace Dollar is physically different from every other date in the series. De Francisci's original models were sculpted in high relief — deep, dramatically rounded contours like a Renaissance medal. The Philadelphia Mint struck only 1,006,473 examples before Mint engravers reduced the relief for 1922, flattening the fields slightly so that coins would stack properly, dies would last longer, and strike quality would be more consistent across large production runs.

The practical result for collectors: the 1921 is a one-year type coin. Anyone building a type set of 20th-century US silver needs one 1921 and at least one coin from 1922–1935. The high-relief design is widely considered the more artistically dramatic of the two.

1921 Peace Dollar: catalog values

With a mintage of 1,006,473 struck late in the year, the 1921 is scarcer than most dates in the series and commands a meaningful premium — especially in mint state, where the high relief makes a fully struck, mark-free example genuinely rare. Values below are from the LuckyCoin catalog; the full grade-by-grade chart is on the Peace Dollar series page.

Catalog snapshot. Coin markets move — for any transaction, verify current dealer pricing and the live grade-by-grade chart.

Production history: three coinage runs

The Peace Dollar's production history breaks into three distinct chapters, each driven by different economic forces.

First run: 1921–1928

After the 1921 high-relief launch, Philadelphia switched to the low-relief design and production ramped up dramatically. The years 1922 and 1923 alone account for the majority of the series' total mintage, with Philadelphia, Denver, and San Francisco all striking large quantities. Output then declined through the mid-1920s as the post-war silver-replacement obligation under the Pittman Act wound down. The 1928 Philadelphia issue, with a mintage of only 360,649, is the smallest of the entire series and one of the three key dates — see its value table below.

Mid-series gap: 1929–1933

No Peace Dollars were struck for five years. The Great Depression collapsed commercial demand for silver dollars; the coins were circulating poorly even before the economy contracted, and the Mint saw no reason to produce more. This gap has no collector consequence for date-set builders — there are simply no coins to find — but it does mean that the series has a clean three-era structure rather than one continuous run.

Second run: 1934–1935

The Silver Purchase Act of 1934 revived dollar coinage briefly. Only four date-mintmark combinations appeared: 1934-P, 1934-D, 1934-S, and 1935-P and 1935-S. Of these the 1934-S is the third key date of the series — see its value table below. Production ended in 1935 and was never resumed under the original design.

Key date: 1928 Peace Dollar

The 1928 Philadelphia issue carries the lowest mintage of any regularly struck Peace Dollar: 360,649. Because it was struck late in the first coinage run when demand was falling, distribution was uneven, and many examples saw heavy circulation before collectors recognized the date's significance. Catalog values from the LuckyCoin database:

Catalog snapshot. For any transaction, verify current dealer pricing and the live grade-by-grade chart.

Key date: 1934-S Peace Dollar

The 1934-S presents a counterintuitive case: its mintage of 1,011,000 is nearly three times that of the 1928, yet in higher grades it is dramatically more expensive. The explanation is strike quality. San Francisco's 1934 dollar dies produced consistently weak strikes — Liberty's hair above the ear and the eagle's breast feathers are typically flat even on technically uncirculated coins. Finding a sharply struck, fully lustrous 1934-S in MS-63 or above is genuinely difficult, which compresses the population at the top grades and sends prices sharply higher. Catalog values:

Catalog snapshot. For any transaction, verify current dealer pricing and the live grade-by-grade chart.

The 1965 reissue that never happened

In 1965, with silver being stripped from the coinage system, Congress briefly authorized the striking of Peace Dollars dated 1964 — a political gesture toward Western silver-mining states that had lobbied for continued silver-dollar production. The Denver Mint struck 316,076 examples before the project was cancelled and all coins were ordered melted. No 1964-dated Peace Dollar has ever been confirmed in private hands; possessing one would technically be illegal under current law, as the coins were never officially released. This episode has no collecting consequence — there are no coins to acquire — but it does underscore how politically charged silver-dollar policy remained decades after the series ended.

The Eisenhower Dollar series, launched in 1971, used clad metal rather than silver for circulation strikes, marking a permanent break from the 90%-silver dollar tradition the Peace Dollar had represented.

The modern Peace Dollar program: 2021–present

On January 5, 2021, President Trump signed legislation authorizing the United States Mint to issue Morgan and Peace Dollars for the centennial of the 1921 transition between the two designs. The 2021 Peace Dollar — released August 10, 2021 with a mintage of 200,000 — carried no mint mark (matching the original Philadelphia coins) and was struck in .999 fine silver with an uncirculated finish. Each modern coin contains 0.858 troy ounces of pure silver, more than the 0.7734 oz in an original 90%-silver Peace Dollar.

No 2022 Peace Dollar was produced — the Mint announced plans for 2022 issues but cancelled them in March 2022, citing supply-chain problems, production capacity limits, and the rising price of silver. The program resumed in 2023 with three finishes: an Uncirculated struck at Philadelphia (no mint mark, 275,000 mintage limit), a Proof struck at San Francisco (S mint mark), and a Reverse Proof issued as part of a two-coin set with the Morgan Dollar. The 2023 Uncirculated sold out on its release day. The Mint has continued the program annually since: 275,000 Uncirculated coins were authorized for 2024 and 150,000 for 2025.

Modern Peace Dollars are collector-only issues, not legal-tender circulation strikes. They reproduce de Francisci's original design with the addition of the current year as the date. Most date-set collectors treat the 1921–1935 run as the "real" series and the 2021-present coins as a separate modern type, though some collectors pursue both.

Where the Peace Dollar sits in collecting today

Most collectors approach the Peace Dollar as the natural companion to the Morgan Dollar. The two series together cover every 90%-silver business-strike dollar from 1878 through 1935, and many collectors complete one before tackling the other. The Peace series is the shorter and — for most dates — considerably cheaper of the two; the three key dates (1921, 1928, 1934-S) are expensive but not in the same stratosphere as the rarest Morgans.

For collectors interested in silver coinage more broadly, our guide to pre-1965 silver coins covers the full landscape of 90% silver US issues, and our Morgan Dollar key dates guide runs through the most important dates in the preceding series. The full US Dollars series index on LuckyCoin lists every dollar type with live catalog values.