HispanicBusiness

Attention quarter collectors: It's time to make room in your displays for the latest 25-cent piece.

With the recent completion of a 10-year mission to roll out new quarters for each of the 50 states, the U.S. Mint is poised to release the first of five quarters commemorating the U.S. territories, starting with Puerto Rico.

The new quarter will be available on Monday at your corner bank, but the official celebration will be on Thursday in the city of San Juan, Puerto Rico.

The back of the new coin features a historic sentry box and a hibiscus flower with the inscriptions, PUERTO RICO and Isla del Encanto, which means "Isle of Enchantment."

The sentry box is emblematic of the U.S. commonwealth's trademark stone fortifications, built by the Spaniards in the early 16th century to protect against foreign invaders. The odiferous flower is ubiquitous across the island.

Thursday's event will be followed by four others, roughly eight weeks apart, in Guam, American Samoa, the U.S. Virgin Islands and the Northern Mariana Islands.

Attending Thursday's bash will be Ed Moy, director of the U.S. Mint, who told HispanicBusiness.com that he loves a good quarter-commemoration party.

"Since I've been Mint director, I've been to dozen -- they are a lot of fun," he said. "They pull out all the stops."

The party is open to the public and will feature a Spanish guitar performance and a coin exchange. Best of all, every child under 18 will receive a shiny new quarter.

Also attending the party will be Puerto Rican Gov. Luis Fortuno and his wife, First Lady Luce Vela Gutierrez.

The "2009 District of Columbia and U.S. Territories Program" began earlier this year with the D.C. quarter, inscribed with a rendering of Duke Ellington at his piano. The program came about due to the success of the "50 States Quarters Program" that ran from 1999 to 2008.

The quarters were released in the order states were admitted into the Union, beginning with Delaware and ending with Hawaii.

Explorer Christopher Columbus arrived on the island in 1493, and it soon became a Spanish colony. The stone-wall fortresses helped the Spaniards successfully fend off the French, Dutch and English. But in 1898, the island was ceded to the United States at the end of the Spanish-American War. In 1917, its residents became U.S. citizens.

On July 3, 1950, Congress passed a law authorizing Puerto Rico to draft its own constitution, and it officially became a United States commonwealth on July 25, 1952.

The design decision was made by a committee appointed by former Puerto Rican Gov. Aníbal Acevedo-Vilá, who was replaced by Fortuno in January.
The U.S. Mint produced the renderings, which were proposed to the commonwealth, and then given final clearance by then-U.S. Treasury Secretary Henry Paulson on July 31.

The public and media are invited to join United States Mint Director Ed Moy at the launch of the commemorative quarter honoring the Commonwealth of Puerto Rico--the Isla del Encanto--at San Juan's La Arcada in Paseo La Princesa, at 11:00 a.m., Thursday, April 2.