Merit Financial - Kennedy Half Dollar

November 22nd, 1963, a day that burned into the memory of all who lived it, saw the assassination of the thirty-fifth President of the United States. John Fitzgerald Kennedy was shot at 12:30 PM while his motorcade drove through the streets of Dallas, TX. Within hours of his death, US Mint director Eva Adams placed a call to engraver Gilroy Robert informing him that the late president's image was being considered for one of the larger US silver coins. It was President Kennedy's widow Jacqueline who chose the half dollar. She didn't want her husband to replace George Washington on the quarter.

Five days later, the project was approved and commissioned. The Kennedy Half Dollar replaced the Franklin Half, and went into circulation in 1964. When they were first released, the line in Washington to purchase the coins was said to go on for many blocks.

The next year, President Johnson announced plans to eliminate silver content from the majority of American coinage, meaning that the 1964 Kennedy would be the only widely circulated version containing Ninety Percent silver. Though proof Kennedys would continue to be made with the traditional silver content, the standard versions contained only 40% through 1969, and none thereafter. Each 1964 Kennedy contains 0.36 ounces of pure silver.

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