Michigan

Michigan is a state located in the northern United States, and its nickname is “The Great Lakes State.” This is because, just as the name suggests, it is surrounded by some of the world’s largest freshwater lakes, the so-called Great Lakes. Michigan is a place inseparable from this world of water, so whenever the state’s identity is discussed, the lakes always appear together.

Looking at the reverse of the coin, the outline of the state of Michigan and the outline of all the Great Lakes surrounding it are drawn together. And at the top is written the phrase “Great Lakes State.” Instead of a splendid figure or building, it shows what kind of place this state is with simple lines alone, like a map.

This plain image holds a clear meaning. It is that the land of Michigan cannot be explained without the lakes. The large, clear lakes have long been both a route by which people came and went, and a livelihood where they caught fish and shared water. Drawing the outline of the state and the outline of the lakes overlapped is an expression of the pride that “we are people who live together with the water.”

Michigan became the 26th state of the United States on January 26, 1837. And in the 50 States quarter series that began in 1999, it was also 26th in order, issued in 2004. That the order in which a state entered the Union runs parallel to the order in which its coin came out is one of the interesting points of this series.

When you place the maps of the state and the lakes side by side on a single coin, you feel “ah, this is a land of water” even without a long explanation. A single small quarter becomes a first step in learning American geography.