Panel Picks Sacagawea Design for Coins

The U.S. Commission on Fine Arts recommended Thursday that a rendering of Sacagawea with her infant son appear on new gold-colored dollar coins to be minted starting in 2000.

The design is one of three finalists for the coin design chosen by the U.S. Mint after sorting through more than 90,000 comments on the Internet. All feature the Shoshone teenager who accompanied explorers Meriwether Lewis and William Clark to the Pacific Ocean in 1805. Treasury Secretary Robert E. Rubin is scheduled to make the final selection next month.

In the design the commission recommended, Sacagawea is turning, as if ready to go. She looks back over her shoulder and her infant son sleeps on her back.

All three finalist designs are by New Mexico sculptor Glenna Goodacre, who also created the Vietnam Women’s Memorial in Washington and a statue of President Reagan for the Reagan Presidential Library in Simi Valley.

The Mint is accepting comment on the proposed designs through Dec. 28 at its Internet site, https://www.usmint.gov.