National Sites Quarter: Gettysburg, Pennsylvania: Note for a lecture, "E Pluribus Unum? What Keeps the United States United."

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National Sites Quarter: Gettysburg, Pennsylvania

Fifty-six sites will be featured as part of the National Sites Quarters Program. The legislation authorizing this series is "America's Beautiful National Parks Quarter Dollar Coin Act of 2008" (Public Law 110-456). The sites had to be selected with 270 days of approval of the legislation. On August 25, 2009, Secretary of the Treasury Timothy F. Geithner approved the list of sites with consultation with Secretary of the Interior Ken Salazar.

One site was selected from each state, the District of Columbia, and each U.S. territory (Puerto Rico, Guam, America Samoa, the U.S. Virgin Islands, and the Northern Mariana Islands). The program runs from 2010 to 2021. Five different designs are released each year, and the final quarter will be released in the last year. The quarters will be issued in the order that the featured sites were established as a National Site. The US Mint's National Site Registry lists all 56 sites to be featured in the series.

The front of the coin will feature a portrait of George Washington. Rather than using the portrait design used by the State Quarters and U.S. Territories series, the portrait on the America the Beautiful Quarters will be the original portrait used on the quarter since the Washington Quarter was released in 1932.

The first quarter release in 2011, was the Gettysburg National Military Park in Pennsylvania. The reverse shows the 72nd Pennsylvania Infantry Monument, on the battle line of the Union Army at Cemetery Ridge. Inscriptions are "GETTYSBURG," "PENNSYLVANIA," "2011," and "E PLURIBUS UNUM."

Gettysburg was established to "preserve and protect the resources associated with the Battle of Gettysburg and the Soldiers' National Cemetery, and to provide understanding of the events that occurred [there], within the context of American history." Amending the Act of Congress of February 11, 1895 (An Act to Establish a National Military Park at Gettysburg, Pennsylvania, S 3, 28 Stat. 651, codified as amended at 16 U.S.C. § 430g) Gettysburg was established as a National Site. The legislation was sponsored by General Daniel Sickles of New York, whose military career ended with the loss of a leg at the Battle of Gettysburg. The Act directed the War Department to establish Gettysburg National Military Park by accepting a deed from the Gettysburg Battlefield Memorial Association conveying ownership to over 800 acres and 300 monuments.