As penny production ends, we share some interesting facts — including an estimate of how many are currently in circulation.
The penny was born in Philadelphia — and that’s where it ends, too.
The final one-cent piece was stamped Wednesday, at the U.S. Mint on Philly’s Independence Mall, with U.S. Treasury Secretary Scott Bessent and Treasurer Brandon Beach in attendance for the final production run.
The move is part of President Trump’s general cost-cutting since his return to office earlier this year. The president claims each penny costs about four cents to produce, that they are increasingly irrelevant due to inflation, and that the Treasury Department expects to save $56 million per year not making them.
The penny has a long history in Philly. Here are (at least) eight things you should know about the coin and its place in history and the city.
The penny was conceived with the Coinage Act of 1792. The U.S. Mint, located on Seventh Street between Arch and Filbert Streets, produced the nation’s first batch of copper cents — 11,178 of them — in March 1793. Coin production relied on manual labor and horse power, making it slow and labor-intensive.
