Designer
Frank Vittor
The Rodin-trained sculptor who put a Union and a Confederate veteran on the same coin.
He learned to carve under Auguste Rodin, sailed to New York at eighteen to work for America's most famous architect — who was shot dead two weeks later — and stayed anyway. Frank Vittor spent the rest of his life filling Pittsburgh with bronze. Coin collectors know him for one small, quiet thing: the 1936 Battle of Gettysburg half dollar.
Who he was
Frank Vittor was born Francesco Fabio Vittori on January 6, 1888, in Mozzate, near Como in northern Italy. He came from a family of artists, and the talent surfaced early. He studied at an art academy in Milan, then went to Paris — where he trained under Auguste Rodin, the most influential sculptor of the age.
In 1906, at eighteen, Vittor got the break of a lifetime: the celebrated American architect Stanford White brought him to New York to work on his staff. Two weeks after Vittor arrived, White was shot dead in a scandal that filled the front pages — murdered at Madison Square Garden, the building he himself had designed. Vittor had almost no money and very little English. He stayed in America anyway.
He met a Pittsburgh woman, Ade Mae Humphreys, married her, and moved to her city. Pittsburgh became his life's work. He died there on January 24, 1968, at eighty.
The craft
Vittor liked his subjects big. His taste ran to the heroic and the monumental, and Pittsburgh gave him room to indulge it. His towering bronze of Christopher Columbus, on a granite base, was unveiled in Schenley Park in 1958. His statue of Honus Wagner — the legendary shortstop — has stood watch over Pittsburgh baseball for generations, moving with the team from old Forbes Field to the modern ballpark. He sculpted presidents too: busts of Lincoln, Theodore Roosevelt, Woodrow Wilson, Coolidge.
He didn't just make art; he built a community for it. Vittor founded the Pittsburgh Society of Sculptors and taught for years at the Carnegie Institute and the Carnegie Institute of Technology (today's Carnegie Mellon University).
His one coin shows the same instinct, scaled down to thirty millimeters. For the Battle of Gettysburg half dollar he chose the simplest possible image of reconciliation: two old veterans — one Union, one Confederate — their busts overlapping, both facing the same direction. On the reverse, the shields of North and South sit side by side, parted by a fasces (a bundle of rods that stood for civic strength) and wrapped in oak and olive — the old emblems of war and peace. Vittor prepared the plaster models; the federal Commission of Fine Arts liked them from the start, asking only minor changes through its sculptor member, Paul Manship. The Commission approved the designs on March 24, 1937. The coin was struck at the Philadelphia Mint that June — but dated 1936, the year Congress had authorized it.
Key facts
- Born
- January 6, 1888 — Mozzate (Como), Italy
- Died
- January 24, 1968 — Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania
- Nationality
- Italian-American
- Trained under
- Auguste Rodin, Paris; academy in Milan
- Coin design
- Battle of Gettysburg half dollar (dated 1936, struck 1937)
- Notable monuments
- Columbus, Schenley Park (1958); Honus Wagner statue; presidential busts
- Founded
- Pittsburgh Society of Sculptors
Career timeline
- 1888Born in Mozzate, near Como, Italy.
- 1906Brought to New York at 18 by architect Stanford White; White is murdered two weeks later. Vittor stays in America.
- 1958His monumental Christopher Columbus statue is unveiled in Pittsburgh's Schenley Park.
- 1936 (struck 1937)His Battle of Gettysburg half dollar is approved by the Commission of Fine Arts and struck at Philadelphia.
- 1968Dies in Pittsburgh at age 80.
Questions collectors ask
Who designed the Battle of Gettysburg half dollar?
The Pittsburgh sculptor Frank Vittor designed both sides. His models were reviewed and approved by the federal Commission of Fine Arts, with only minor changes requested by its sculptor member, Paul Manship.
Why is the coin dated 1936 if it was struck in 1937?
Congress authorized the half dollar in 1936 to mark the coming 75th anniversary of the Battle of Gettysburg, and that year was carried onto the coin. The designs weren't approved until March 1937, so the actual striking at the Philadelphia Mint happened that June — the date on the coin is the authorization year, not the year it was made.
What do the two faces on the coin represent?
They are a Union and a Confederate veteran, shown in overlapping profile facing the same way — a deliberate image of reconciliation between North and South, struck as the last Civil War veterans were dying out.
Was Frank Vittor a US Mint engraver?
No. Vittor was an independent monumental sculptor based in Pittsburgh, best known for large public statues. The Gettysburg half dollar is his only widely circulated coin design; he was commissioned for it rather than employed by the Mint.