Thomas Who? New Dollar Coin Might Help

In this image provided by the U.S. Mint, the new Jefferson dollar, which will be released in a ceremony at the Jefferson Memorial on Wednesday, Aug. 15, 2007, in Washington, is seen. The coin will go into nationwide circulation on Aug. 16, 2007. (AP Photo/U.S. Mint, HO) (AP)

Skeptics, however, believe they will suffer the same fate as the Sacagawea unless the government gets rid of the $1 bill, something Congress has strongly opposed.

Moy insisted in the interview that the Mint has learned from the failures of the past dollar coins and that the new presidential series has a good chance for success, in part by finding niche markets such as vending machines, where a dollar coin will be more convenient than getting a pocketful of quarters in change.

"Vending machine companies are spending up to $1 billion a year in maintenance costs due to paper jams," he said. "More use of dollar coins will mean less in maintenance costs."

Moy said the program is off to a good start with 700 million presidential coins already ordered by the Federal Reserve to put into circulation in the first eight months, half the time it took the Sacagawea to reach that milestone.

There have been glitches, especially with customers having difficulty finding the coins at their local banks. Moy said that problem is occurring because of misunderstandings on the part of banks about how they can go about reordering coins if they run out.

Moy has appointed a Mint task force to develop solutions to the distribution problems, and he predicts 80 percent to 100 percent of all banks will have the new Jefferson coin this week.

To bolster the coin program's educational aspect, the Mint has developed special lesson plans on its Web site for use by parents and teachers.

The survey to determine people's knowledge of the presidents was based on telephone interviews with 1,000 adults conducted July 18-25. It has a sampling error of plus or minus 4 percentage points.

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On the Net:

U.S. Mint: http://www.usmint.gov