Honoring National Skyscraper Day with Coins

September 3 marks a national holiday that should loom larger on more calendars than it does. We’re talking about, of course, one of New York City’s favorite holidays (and Chicago’s), National Skyscraper Day. Why honor the nation’s tallest buildings on September 3? That’s the day in 1856 that Louis H. Sullivan was born in Boston. Dubbed the “Father of Skyscrapers” by many, Sullivan pioneered the use of steel-frame construction, which facilitated the advent of multistory buildings during the latter decades of the 19th century. It was an innovation that changed the game for urban architects in the United States and around the world.

Yet, the groundbreaking architect didn’t just build tall – he also implemented new design concepts that gave skyscrapers a distinctive look arising from their principal role of maximizing floor space on the small parcel of land. It was he who coined the famous architectural adage, “form follows function.” In other words, the purpose of a building should dictate its design – not the other way around.

The skyscraper became a prominent fixture in big cities around the world as the 19th century melted into the 20th century. Over the next 100 years, skyscrapers kept getting taller and more complex, with the 1931 completion of the Empire State Building in New York City marking achievements that wowed the public and inspired a new generation of architects. The top floor of the Empire State Building reached 1,250 feet and placed the Midtown Manhattan landmark as the tallest building in the world for some 40 years.

The completion of the World Trade Center’s “Twin Towers” in Lower Manhattan in 1973 and Chicago’s Sears Tower (now Willis Tower) in 1974, along with the widespread adoption of glass-curtain facades in the late 1970s and early 1980s, fueled a wave of larger, sleeker skyscrapers that define the modern skyline today. The visage of these and other skyscrapers is captured on two U.S. coins that are readily obtainable by collectors. These two coins are the 2003 Illinois State Quarter and 2015 Mohawk Ironworkers Native American Dollar.

On the reverse of the 2003 Illinois Quarter, one sees a central figure of Abraham Lincoln, who spent the crux of his adult life in the Prairie State. The likeness of Lincoln is superimposed on an outlined image of the state’s geographic borders, with a bucolic silhouette of a farm on the left and rising to the right the contemporary skyline of Chicago.

The 2015 Mohawk Ironworkers Dollar takes us back east to New York City. On the bustling reverse, a courageous Mohawk ironworker appears to be stepping into the scene on the coin. His left hand clutches the circular border framing the design, his right guides a steel I-beam into place as the Chrysler Building, Rockefeller Center, and the Empire State Building dominate the Big Apple’s skyline in the background.

Neither coin is necessarily expensive, with the quarter available in circulation at face value and the dollar obtainable for as little as a few dollars from virtually any dealer of United States coins. In higher, PCGS-graded states these coins – in all their business-strike and proof formats – become desirable additions to the best PCGS Registry Sets for their categories. Yet, these coins in any manifestation honor the high-flying spirit of the skyscraper and its impact on modern society throughout the United States and in metropolitan areas around the world.