The US Mint has announced that it will discontinue the production of pennies in early 2026. It seems that the humble penny is yet another American institution which will not survive the nation's Semiquincentennial.
The Philadelphia Mint "struck" the first official US Penny in 1793, the year after the Mint was established by Congress. It has been copper (or copper-plated) ever since.
From 1859 to 1909, the Mint produced the "Indian Head" penny. Then, in 1909 (which was the Centenary of Abraham Lincoln's birth), the Mint produced the Lincoln Penny with the president's profile on the obverse (and wheat sheafs on the reverse). This coincided with a period of "Lincoln Mania" in America—and the public really embraced the new coin. It also happened to be the first widely-circulated American coin bearing the likeness of an American president. George Washington, America's first president, had discouraged placing presidents on US coins, thinking that it would be "too monarchical."
In 1959, on the 150th Anniversary of Lincoln's birth, the penny was changed again—now portraying the Lincoln Memorial (dedicated in 1922) on the reverse. In 2009, in commemoration of Lincoln's 200th birthday, the Mint produced four commemorative pennies (with four different Lincoln-related images on the reverse). Since 2010, the reverse of the Lincoln penny has shown a Union Shield—honoring the slain president's success in holding-together the Union.
Shown above, a coin bank made about the same time when Lincoln's profile first appeared on the penny. The bank is made of steel—embossed with fanciful figures: cherubs, acrobats, flowers, birds. Perhaps a number of those new Lincoln pennies found their way into coin banks such as this. Click on the photo above to learn more about it.
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