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936 was the year of the commemorative half dollar. As a speculative mania developed in these special coins, no less than 16 new designs appeared. In addition, several existing types were reissued with the date 1936, since their authorized mintages had not yet been reached. In all, collectors active in that year could chose from a total of 21 different commemorative coins bearing the current date, a record not likely to ever be broken. Almost lost among this bewildering array of special coins was an unpretentious issue marking the 300th anniversary of European settlement on New York’s Long Island. To everyone’s surprise, it proved one of the best selling and least controversial offerings to come out of that memorable year.
The first white people to establish a community on Long Island were Dutch immigrants who arrived in 1636. A deal was soon struck with the 13 Algonquin tribes inhabiting the island, securing it for the Netherlands. In reference to its size (118 miles in length), the Dutch chose to call it Lange Eylandt (Long Island). Their small settlement on the southwestern shore of the island they named Breuckelin after a town in Holland. This little village on Jamaica Bay would ultimately be renamed Brooklyn, reflecting the growing English population which gradually came to unseat the Dutch. Although resentment against the encroaching English grew, there was little the Dutch could do in the long run, since their own government in Holland proved quite miserly in providing for the defense of its New World lands. Briefly recaptured by the Dutch during their 1673 war with England, a peace settlement the following year returned Long Island to the English, who retained control until the end of the War of Independence in 1783, when it was surrendered to the Americans.
To mark the 300th anniversary of the first European settlement, a Long Island Tercentenary Committee was formed with Louis C. Wills as its chairman. As occurred so often with such organizations, the idea was to have a commemorative coin issued as a means of defraying the cost of the celebration; and, as with most such plans, they were made far too late. The Long Island Tercentenary Celebration was slated for May of 1936, yet a bill providing for the mintage of 100,000 coins to mark this event wasn’t passed until April 13 of that year.
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