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Obverse – Thomas Jefferson
Early in 1938, the United States Treasury Department announced a public competition
to solicit designs to replace those that were featured on the obverse and reverse of
the 5-cent coin (nickel) that year.
The rules of the competition specified that the new nickel’s obverse was to feature an
authentic portrait of Thomas Jefferson and that the coin’s reverse would recognize
Monticello, his historic home near Charlottesville, Virginia.
After 390 sets of models were submitted by some of the country’s most accomplished artists
and sculptors, the designs of German-American sculptor Felix Schlag were selected, earning
him the advertised $1,000 prize in April 1938.
The portrait he submitted, the familiar left-facing profile of Thomas Jefferson, was based
on a bust by sculptor Jean-Antoine Houdon and featured Jefferson dressed in a period coat
and wearing a traditional 18th Century peruke wig.
For the next sixty-seven years, Americans have reached into their pockets and found nickels
featuring this portrait of Jefferson, our Nation’s third president and principal author of
the Declaration of Independence.
Reverse – Monticello
Jefferson designed Monticello himself, and construction began in 1768 when he was 25 years
old. It was completed in 1823 when the former President and patriot was in his eightieth
year. A skilled horticulturalist, Jefferson also planned the smallest details of the
landscaping at Monticello.
Accompanying Schlag’s classic portrait of Thomas Jefferson on the obverse, the vision of
Monticello that graced the nickel’s reverse from 1938 to 2003 remained essentially unchanged
since its debut.
Schlag made several changes to his original reverse design at the request of the Treasury
Department, including the angle from which Monticello is viewed and the initial art-deco style
of lettering. These modifications resulted in the depiction carried on the nickel from 1938
until 2004, when legislation calling for the redesign of the nickel resulted in the Westward
Journey Nickel Series™.
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