A new era in United States coinage dawned in 1971 with the launch of the Eisenhower dollar. It was the first dollar coin issued since the Peace dollar series ended in 1935. Unfortunately the large-size "Ike" dollars, which had the same diameter as the old-style cartwheels, were too big and heavy for most consumers. By September 1974, numismatic writer Clement F. Bailey had dubbed the Ike dollar a "successful failure". And over the next five decades, the United States Mint issued four more dollar coin programs that also became "successful failures".

Each one is chronicled in A Guide Book of Modern United States Dollars, by Q. David Bowers (Whitman, 2016).

Spurned by the American public, the five modern one-dollar coins eventually came to be loved by many collectors-including me. I first noticed them early in my collecting career as a 12-year-old in 1993. Large Ike dollars were pretty novel to a kid who had only ever seen cents, nickels, dimes, quarters and the occasional half dollar. Meanwhile, the saga of the beleaguered Susan B. Anthony dollar, whose misery ended during my birth year of 1981 following a three-year production stint, captivated my burgeoning interests as a young collector.

But as I grew older and became more involved in the hobby as a writer in my twenties, I learned I was far from the only person who enjoys collecting modern dollars.

In this book, Bowers offers his renowned perspective on the one-dollar coins of the last 50 years to all such collectors. He does so with the assistance of several notable modern coin experts, including R.W. Julian, David Lange, David McHenry, Tom DeLorey, Rob Ezerman, Bill Fivaz, Gerald Higgs, Andy Oskam, James Sego, Frank Van Valen, and CoinWeek's own resident Eisenhower dollar enthusiast, Charles Morgan.

Before Modern Dollars, there were virtually no major publications dedicated to the small-size one-dollar coins that followed Ikes (previous works by John Wexler and Rob Ezerman, among others, had focused on Eisenhower dollars). In this regard, Modern Dollars serves as a comprehensive compendium that fills in critical information gaps.

To read the complete article, see:
First Read: A Guide Book of Modern United States Dollar Coins(www.coinweek.com/education/numismatic-books/first-read/first-read-guide-book-modern-united-states-dollar-coins/)