History of the Lincoln Penny

President Theodore Roosevelt hated US currency and coins.  Actually he hated what he considered to be the lack of artistic merit of the designs on the currency and coins.  As part of his overhaul of the currency, the Lincoln penny was born.  In putting Lincoln on the penny TR was breaking with a long-standing tradition that no person appear on regularly circulating US coins but rather idealized personifications of  concepts such as liberty.  The new pennies were issued on August 2, 1909, the centennial year of Lincoln’s birth.