United States Franklin half dollar

The United States Franklin half dollar is a fifty-cent coin struck by the United States Mint between 1948 and 1963. Commissioned under Mint Director Nellie Tayloe Ross, who had long admired Benjamin Franklin, the piece was produced at the Philadelphia, Denver, and San Francisco mints. Released into circulation in April 1948, the coin remained in regular production until 1963, after which it was replaced in 1964 by the Kennedy half dollar.

Ross instructed Chief Engraver John R. Sinnock in 1947 to prepare designs for the new half dollar. Sinnock adapted the obverse portrait from his earlier medal based on a bust of Franklin by Jean-Antoine Houdon. Following Sinnock's death in May 1947, the design work was completed by his successor, Gilroy Roberts. Although submitted to the Commission of Fine Arts for an advisory opinion, the designs met disapproval over the diminutive eagle and the depiction of the crack in the Liberty Bell. Despite these objections, the Treasury Department approved the design without alterations.

Produced in 90 per cent silver with a reeded edge, the coin features a portrait of Franklin in a period suit on the obverse, with Sinnock's initials, 'JRS', placed at the cutoff of the shoulder. The reverse depicts the Liberty Bell, based on a sketch by John Frederick Lewis that Sinnock had utilised on the 1926 sesquicentennial commemorative half dollar. A small eagle appears to the right of the bell, added to fulfil the legal requirements of the Coinage Act of 1873.