1916-P Standing Liberty Quarter
Key dateThe key of the series and one of the lowest mintages of any twentieth-century U.S. coin. Hermon A. MacNeil's design was approved so late in 1916 that only 52,000 quarters were struck before the year ended, and they were released alongside the far more numerous 1917 coins, so most entered circulation unrecognised.
Mintage
- Business strikes
- 52,000
- Mint
- Philadelphia (no mintmark)
- Mintage rank
- 1 of 37
Rank 1 is the lowest business-strike mintage in the series. Mintage is what the Mint produced, not what survives. These circulated through the 1920s and 1930s and were melted for their silver later, none of it recorded by date. On the 1916-1924 issues the date itself wore away, so a large share of what survives cannot be attributed to a year at all.
Reading the figure
It is the smallest of the 15 Philadelphia issues in the series. It is the only issue of the series struck in 1916. The series median is 3,586,400, so fewer than half as many of these were struck as a typical date. 1916 was the smallest production year of the entire series. In 1916 the coin was struck at Philadelphia; Denver and San Francisco struck none.
Every sentence above is computed from the mintage table on this page, not asserted separately.
Scarcity tier
Key date
Assigned from reported mintage alone: under 750,000 is a key date, under 2,500,000 is a semi-key.
This is a reproducible label derived from the mintage column, not a market valuation and not a Coin Curator price opinion. The same thresholds apply to every series on this site. Several dates are far harder or far easier to obtain than their mintage implies; where that is true, it is stated above.
The date wears off the early issues. On the 1916-1924 quarters the date sits raised on a pedestal at the base of the obverse, exposed to every hand that touched the coin. Read the full note on the series page.
What to check before buying
Specific to the 1916-P:
- 1This date is counterfeited and, more often, faked by altering a 1917 Type 1 quarter, which shares the same design. Compare the date position and the shape of the digits against reference photographs.
- 2Certification by a major service is the practical baseline here, and the certification number should be verified on the service's own lookup.
- 3Confirm the date is genuinely struck and legible rather than restored with acid, which leaves a dull pitted patch around the digits. The grading services will not certify an acid-treated coin.
And for any certified coin
Verify the certification number on the grading service’s own lookup rather than from a photograph of the label, match the listing images to the certification record including grade and any variety attribution, look for cleaning, compare the mintmark against published photographs of the genuine issue, and read the return policy before buying. The grading guide covers each of these in full.
Coin Curator does not grade, authenticate, or appraise coins, and publishes no price or population data. These are verification steps, not a valuation.
Verify a certification number
Look a 1916-Pcertification number up on the service’s own site. A photograph of a label proves nothing.
Each service publishes its own guarantee with conditions and exclusions. Compare PCGS, NGC and ANACS.
Find a 1916-P for sale
Opens an eBay search for this exact date and mint. Coin Curator does not list inventory, hold stock, or quote prices; verify each listing, seller, and return policy directly.
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Common questions
How many 1916-P Standing Liberty quarters were minted?
The Philadelphia Mint struck 52,000 1916-P Standing Liberty quarters for circulation. That is the 1st lowest business-strike mintage of the 37 date and mintmark combinations in the series.
Is the 1916-P Standing Liberty quarter a key date?
Coin Curator labels it a key date, assigned from reported mintage alone: under 750,000 struck is a key date and under 2,500,000 is a semi-key. The same thresholds are used for every series on this site, so the tiers are comparable between them. That label describes production, not market value or how hard the coin is to find today. The key of the series and one of the lowest mintages of any twentieth-century U.S. coin. Hermon A. MacNeil's design was approved so late in 1916 that only 52,000 quarters were struck before the year ended, and they were released alongside the far more numerous 1917 coins, so most entered circulation unrecognised.
What should I check before buying a 1916-P Standing Liberty quarter?
Verify the certification number on the grading service's own lookup page, match the listing photographs to the certification record, check for cleaning, and compare the mintmark shape and position against published photographs of the genuine issue. This date is counterfeited and, more often, faked by altering a 1917 Type 1 quarter, which shares the same design. Compare the date position and the shape of the digits against reference photographs.
Related dates
Guides for this coin
All guides →Building a US Type Set
Build a U.S. type set by defining the included designs, grade targets, verification rules, and a current coin-by-coin budget.
2 min readMarket ContextJunk Silver vs Graded Silver: Which Is the Better Hold?
Pre-1965 US silver coins (junk silver) trade on melt value plus a small premium. Graded examples of the same coins trade on numismatics. Which strategy actually wins long-term?
1 min readEducationWhat Makes a Coin a “Key Date”, and Why It Drives Value
Coins from the same series can differ sharply in availability and demand. Learn how date, mintmark, variety, grade, and surfaces shape key-date research.
1 min readBuying GuideApproachable Key-Date Coins to Research First
Seven dates that teach scarcity, identification, grade tradeoffs, and counterfeit-aware buying, without promising a fixed price or resale result.
1 min readMintage sources
Mintage figures are U.S. Mint production records, cross-checked against the published tables below on 2026-08-01. Where those tables disagree, the disagreement is disclosed on the affected page rather than resolved silently.
- CoinMintages.com, Standing Liberty quarter mintages — Reports the 1917 Variety 1 and Variety 2 issues separately for each mint.
- LandOfCoins, Standing Liberty quarter mintage — Independent table. Agrees with the above on every one of the 37 issues.
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