Have you ever noticed on the really early American coins where there was a representation of a female "Liberty"; she looked very matronly, and sort of grandmother-like.
The Draped Bust and Capped Bust liberties in my opinion weren't particularly attractive women. This was generally true on both the gold and silver coinage from the late 1700's up to the early 1900's.
The US Mint evidently couldn't afford to have different dies designed for each denomination of coin. When they chose a theme, they used it on all their silver coinage. Flowing Hair, Draped Bust, Liberty Seated and Barber were good examples of this. It wasn't until the later 1800's that different images were used on each denominational value.
Some advances were made in the Liberty Seated silver coinage by Christian Gobrecht, as well as in the trade dollar. They had more symbolism in the portrayal of Miss Liberty and more attractive renderings. Generally though, these two coins depicted few facial features.
Charles Barber designs were not outstanding by any measure, and made the new 1916 Liberty Standing and the 1916 Walking Liberty designs that much more impressive by contrast. Their time had come.
In 1907, Theodore Roosevelt hired Augustus St.Gaudens to change the image of US gold coins. Prior gold coins universally depicted an almost silly looking woman as Miss Liberty. St.Gaudens revolutionized our gold double eagle coins by showing a frontal view of an attractive woman symbolizing US values and courage.
Prior to this, US coins only had profile views of the bas-relief sculptural subject. This now set the standard for the much improved Liberty Standing quarter and Walking Liberty half dollar. The era of the marginally ugly coin had finally ended.
Following St.Gaudens' lead, an attractive depiction of a female liberty was the 1916/1917 Liberty Standing quarter dollar, designed by Hermon MacNeil. This original version with the exposed right breast of liberty wasn't acceptable to the American public, even though partial nudity on coins was somewhat commonplace in Europe at the time.
In the same year, 1916, Adolph Weinman's design of the Walking Liberty half dollar also depicted a very attractive young woman symbolizing liberty. In both these issues, "Miss Liberty" became much younger and more attractive. 1916 was a good year for improving the image of US silver coinage.
Anthony de Francisci, designer of the Peace dollar certainly used a younger, and much more attractive model/representation of liberty than George Morgan chose for the Morgan silver dollar. Don't get me wrong, I love the intricate hair detail in the Morgan dollar. The details are what make that coin so exceptional.
In 1909, another change started taking place in US coinage. Rather than an anonymous representation of liberty, they started placing the image of an inspiring leader on the obverse. We started seeing the likes of Lincoln, Roosevelt, Washington, Kennedy or Franklin on our fractional coinage.
We don't get back to a really ugly face again until the Eisenhower "silver" dollars were made. But that's in a different time, a time when silver isn't being used in silver coins anymore.
The US is no longer representing a metaphoric Miss Liberty on its coins, but inspiring leaders... and while Ike was a great general, as a president, he wasn't that inspiring.
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