Apollo 14 (Mini-Coin)
Year: 1971
Mint/Issuer: The Franklin Mint
Mintage: 129,449
Flown metal: 24 of 195 sterling silver medallions carried to the lunar orbit.
Additional Information:
According to an article in the September 21, 1971 "Numismatic", an investigation led by Congresswoman Leonor Sullivan discovered the silver carried to the Moon for the FM remained in the Command Module, negating any chance that it touched the lunar surface. Apparently, at the time, the FM was promoting that the silver had "been on the Moon," leading to the congressional inquiry. A pre-flight agreement between Shepard and the FM (through a representative for the astronaut) led to the flight of 200 coins, of which 25 were to be returned to the Mint. In actuality, 24 were received by the FM, later learning the representative had decided to keep one for him/herself. At the time (1971) the FM was taking actions to recover the 25th coin. However, it was too late for production of the mini-coins, so only 24 were used in the production. Dr. Mitchell was able to confirm that each crewmember carried 65 of the Franklin Mint medals aboard the command module, Kitty Hawk, intheir command module Personal Preference Kits or PPKs. He also confirmed that none of these went in the lunar module, Antares, to the lunar surface.
