Celebrate Girl Scouts with the 2013-W Girl Scouts Silver Dollar

The Girl Scouts was founded by Juliette Gordon Low on March 12, 1912, and went on to become one of the most influential organizations for girls and women in the United States and beyond. The mission of the Girl Scouts is to “build girls of courage, confidence, and character, who make the world a better place.” The group does this through a variety of activities and social causes, including engaging in community service projects, camping, and learning a variety of life, social, and leadership skills.

The Girl Scouts have certainly been successful in creating leaders representing all kinds of fields. Some of the most famous Girl Scouts alumni include Senator Hillary Clinton, First Ladies Laura Bush and Michelle Obama, Secretary of State Madeleine Albright, first American woman in space Sally Ride, ABC anchorwoman Barbara Walters, Brigadier General Linda Stierle, actors Lucille Ball and Grace Kelly, singers Taylor Swift and Dionne Warwick, People magazine publisher Ann Moore, athletes Peggy Fleming and Venus Williams, author Gloria Steinem, advice columnist Ann Landers, and Britain’s Queen Elizabeth II; the latter has appeared on billions of coins since her coronation in 1953 through her passing in 2022.

An organization as empowering as the Girl Scouts doubtlessly deserved its own coin, and that’s exactly what it earned with the 2013 Girl Scouts Silver Dollars. These commemorative coins, issued by the United States Mint, were offered in uncirculated and proof formats, with both being struck by the West Point Mint. They were sold by the U.S. Mint with regular issue prices of $55.95 and $59.95, respectively.

A surcharge of $10 from the sale of each coin was supposed to have been paid to the Girl Scouts to benefit its program development. However, in a sad twist of fate, barely a third of the authorized 350,000 coins sold, with just 37,462 uncirculated coins distributed along with 86,355 proofs. It was the first time an organization designated in commemorative coin legislation to receive surcharges from the sale of its commemorative coin did not due to program costs not being covered. While this was an unfortunate turn of events for the Girl Scouts, the silver dollar remains a powerful reminder of the incredible good this organization has done for girls and women, not to mention all of society.