Fort McHenry National Monument and Historic Shrine Quarter
The fourth quarter to be released in 2013 by the US Mint will be the 2013 Fort McHenry National Monument and Historic Shrine Quarter. This strike honors the site in Maryland and will be the nineteenth quarter to that point to be released as part of the Mint’s America the Beautiful Quarters® Program.
Included in the program are five quarter dollars issued annually since the program began in 2010. The strikes in the program feature reverse designs emblematic of selected sites of national interest from around the United States and its territories. The program will end in 2021 when the last of fifty-six new quarter dollars have been issued as part of it.
Sometime during the fall of 2013, the Fort McHenry National Monument and Historic Shrine Quarter should be released into circulation. However, the design for this quarter will probably not be known until late the previous year. That is when the US Mint should announce the designs for all five of the 2013 America the Beautiful Quarters which have been selected by the Treasury Secretary.
There will be three other coins released before the Fort McHenry National Monument and Historic Shrine Quarter, and they are the White Mountain National Forest Quarter, the Perry’s Victory and International Peace Memorial Quarter, and the Great Basin National Park Quarter. The last strike of the series to be released in 2013 will be the Mount Rushmore National Memorial Quarter.
Fort McHenry National Monument and Historic Shrine information
Fort McHenry National Monument and Historic Shrine was established to commemorate the located in the Baltimore Harbor of Maryland. During the War of 1812, Baltimore Harbor played an important role against Great Britain. Fort McHenry was built to help protect the harbor during the American Revolution and was used again during the War of 1812.
On September 13, 1814, British troops attempted to take Baltimore Harbor, which was poorly protected. Only Fort McHenry and a few sunken blockades stood in the British warship’s way. The battle against fort McHenry lasted for 25 hours, with the British warships eventually retreating as Fort McHenry withstood their bombardment, mostly due to poor accuracy from the British ships.
Francis Scott Key was a witness to this battle while aboard a truce ship. The firefight inspired him to write “The Star-Spangled Banner”, a poem that became the national anthem years later.
Since the war of 1812, Fort McHenry has served several purposes, such as a military prison, a hospital and a Coast Guard base. Fort McHenry became a national park in 1925 and in 1939 it was finally named Fort McHenry National Monument and Historic Shrine. It is estimated that almost 750,000 people visit a year.