My Jefferson Wartime Silver Nickels
Private
Updated:
6/1/2026
Views: 366
"Won't you give me five steps, give me five steps mister, give five steps toward the door and you won't see me no more." As I recall that had something to do with the reverse of the Jefferson Nickel. The five step variety is generally scarce and of greater value. I doubt Lynyrd Skynyrd had a Jefferson nickel in mind when he penned those lyrics, or one's similar. Seems he was more focused on someone named Linda Lou and a man with a gun; or something like that. However, he and Thomas were both southern men, and I suppose you'd never know -- I guess. Just sayin . . .
The image to the left is the World War II Memorial in Washington, D.C. It was that conflagration that gave birth to this silver alloy nickel and their steel penny cousins. Necessity was the motivation for the change in the metallurgy of these coins, and that necessity was because another country attacked our armed forces in Hawaii and that country had allies who subsequentially declared war on us. That was a different era, and a scary one. I had relatives who fought in that war, and heard first hand some of their tales, albeit, they mostly didn't want to talk very much about the bad times.
As a kid these nickels looked different, I had no idea they were 35% silver. When my Dad explained to me about nickel and copper being important to the War effort I began to understand why the difference in the looks of these nickels. It is also interesting that the silver nickels had an exception, the 1942 D is the nickel which is not of the silver variety. The same issue is involved with the composition of the penny in 1943, it was made of steel. The nickels in this set, for the most part, started with raw nickels I had graded, and these will be upgraded when I find the time and money to do so.
Thomas Jefferson is the image on the obverse, and as such this coin has been personified. However, even so, this coin is more interesting than the person who graces its obverse -- not that Jefferson is one of the most interesting of the founding fathers -- he is. What drives this coin is the era in which it was produced and why it is different than all the others in this series.
Coins have many stories. The designer, the esthetics, the collectability, the market value, their history, even their role in an economic system. All stories of interest and importance. Sometimes a set is staked out which cries out for a particular story to be told. In my humble opinion this set is just such a set.
This coin has a technical story central to its existence. Not one of era and personification like Eisenhower dollars and Franklin half dollars. This story is event external to the numismatics impacting what the very metallurgy of the coin would be. In other words, exogenous factors were to determine what composed our five cent coins. The metals we had selected to strike our nickels from, now would be taken from that use, because we had another set of priorities. The use of metal reflects its value, and monetary values are how we generally think about such issue. However, 1941's bombing of Pearl Habor changed all of that.
The piece time uses of nickel were primarily for coins, but there were industrial applications which were also perfect for the metal. As it turns out, nickel was absolutely necessary for the making of war with the technology that was then available. The technology of the day meant that military applications of nickel were of critical importance and that priority superceded everything else. The changed priority resulted in nickel being taken out of our coinage.
The story requires some minimal knowledge of metallurgy, then the application of that knowledge to the products necessary for the Navy and the Army to accomplish their missions. That story will be developed and told as we proceed through the war years and the increased demand for nickel and then our hesitancy to return to the previous civilian uses. To tell the story, I used the comments for each year and mint mark in keeping with how that history unfolded.
This is a completed set, but not all that competitive. There are lots of slots that can be improved upon, and it will likely be upgraded over time. I began this set on June 6, 2024.
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