Bill Jones' Commemorative Type Set
VERMONT 1927

Owner Comments:

Super smooth, lustrous white. Has the die break on Ira Allen's forehead.



There was considerable debate about the design that would appear on this coin. The original drawings depicted the Catamount Tavern, which was a meeting place where Ira Allen and his more famous brother Ethan cooked up their plans to fight the Vermont portion of the Revolutionary War. (In truth had it not been for the war with the British, the Allan boys might well have gone to war with New York state, which claimed Vermont as part of its territory.) The Fine Arts Commission did not care for the design however, and asked that it be changed. The result was the catamount cat, which appears on the reverse of the coin. The symbolism flew over the heads of most people, but the resulting coin does have an esthetic charm.