½ Dollar (Panama-Pacific Exposition)

The 1915-S Panama-Pacific Half Dollar

In 1915 San Francisco built a fantasy city of pastel palaces on the bay to celebrate the Panama Canal — and to prove it had risen from the 1906 earthquake. To pay for it, the Mint struck this half dollar. It was the first US commemorative ever made at a branch mint, and the first US coin of any kind to carry the words IN GOD WE TRUST on a commemorative.