01
The elk
The antlers and body establish the foreground subject.
Olympic
National Park
Where rain becomes a landscape.
An elk, a river valley, and distant peaks bring the Olympic Peninsula into silver.
Read the reverse ⟶
DenominationQuarter dollar
Weight5 troy ounces
Fineness99.9% silver
Diameter76.2 mm
Mint markNone · bullion
IssuerUnited States Mint
The illustrated edition
Illustrated: P-mint-mark five-ounce uncirculated edition. The standard bullion edition has no mint mark.
Official U.S. Mint gallery ↗Reverse design anatomy
A living foreground.
A mountain horizon.
The reverse places a Roosevelt elk on a gravel river bar, with Mount Olympus rising in the background. Trees and sloping ground connect the two scales.
The following close reading describes visible forms. It does not assign undocumented intentions to the artists.
02
The mountain
Mount Olympus occupies the distant upper field.
03
The river bar
Pebbles and uneven ground anchor the elk in its setting.
The place behind the coin
Many climates.
One peninsula.
Olympic protects Pacific shores, temperate rainforest, and glaciated mountains. Elevation and rainfall create strikingly different habitats within one park.
The engraved elk and mountain can be read together as an animal-and-habitat composition; that reading is not a claim about the artists’ intentions.
- CoastPacific shores
- RainforestTemperate forest
- MountainsGlaciated peaks
Synthetic context · not the artist’s source view.
Same design. A larger canvas.
From pocket change
to a statement in silver
The 2011 design also belongs to the circulating quarter. At 76.2 mm, the five-ounce silver coin is 3.14 times wider by diameter—not 3.14 times heavier.
The quarter is a measured outline: an exact authorized quarter photograph is not bound for this page. It is not a miniature bullion image.
Collect with context
Know the design.
Know the object.
Reverse design: Susan Gamble. Sculptor: Michael Gaudioso. Obverse: John Flanagan.
- Standard bullion
- No mint mark · Authorized Purchasers · incuse edge weight and fineness.
- Collector five-ounce
- P mint mark · special finish · a separate object. Collector totals are not bullion mintages.