A $1 coin celebrating the Five Moons Ballerinas is now available for purchase from the U.S. Mint’s website and features Osage ballerina Maria Tallchief in the foreground. Also featured on the coin are the rest of the Five Moons which include her younger sister Marjorie Tallchief, Yvonne Chouteau, Rosella Hightower, and Moscelyne Larkin.
“Celebrated as the ‘Five Moons,’ their legacy of achievement and inclusion continues to influence ballet today. A nod to the Five Moons is presented in the lunar motif, while the four ballerinas in the background are symbolic of both Tallchief’s American Indian ballerina contemporaries and the generations of dancers they inspired,” according to a description of the coin.
The coins are part of the Native American $1 Coin program. The obverse (heads) design features a portrait of Sacagawea carrying her infant son, Jean-Baptiste. The reverse (tails) design features the Five Moon Ballerinas. The coins have a circulating finish but have never been placed in circulation. The coins can be purchased from the U.S. Mint’s website and are available in 25-coin rolls, 100-coin bags and 250-coin boxes.
In the fall, a quarter featuring Maria Tallchief will be released as part of the American Women Quarters Program, according to the U.S. Mint. The quarter features Tallchief in balletic pose with her Osage name written in the Osage orthography. Her name translates to “Two Standards,” referencing her impact in both Osage and non-Osage societies.
Wahzhazhe Cultural Center Director Addie Hudgins said a reception is being planned for the quarter’s release and patrons will be able to purchase the quarter from the Osage Nation Visitors Center. As to the $1 coins featuring the Five Moons, Hudgins said they have not discussed whether the $1 coin will be offered at the ONVC because they will be moving locations temporarily while renovations take place for the next 6-8 months. The ONVC will be located at the Cultural Center during the renovation period.
The official designs for the 2023 American Women Quarters Program were announced on Aug. 29. The four-year program features coins with reverse (tails) designs emblematic of the accomplishments and contributions of trailblazing American women. Beginning in 2022 and continuing through 2025, the Mint is issuing five quarters in each of these years.
The five women featured in 2023:
Bessie Coleman – first African American and first Native American woman pilot
Edith Kanakaʻole – indigenous Hawaiian composer, custodian of native culture and traditions
Eleanor Roosevelt – first lady, author, and civil liberties advocate
Jovita Idar – Mexican American journalist, activist, teacher, and suffragist
Maria Tallchief – America’s first prima ballerina
Tallchief, who died in 2013 at the age of 88, is considered America’s first prima ballerina. She starred in George Balanchine’s “Firebird,” which catapulted her career in 1949. She was the first Sugar Plum Fairy in Balanchine’s 1952 original production of “The Nutcracker.” She also starred in “Orpheus” and “Scotch Symphony,” among many others.
The daughter of Alex Tall Chief (Osage) and Ruth (Porter) Tall Chief, her early life was spent in Fairfax, Okla., a town five miles west of the Grayhorse Indian Village, one of the Osage Nation’s three cultural districts. She later moved to Los Angeles with her family where she continued her ballet education. She moved to New York City at the age of 17 and made it to the Ballet Russe de Monte Carlo, where she danced from 1942 to 1947. But it was her role with the New York City Ballet from 1948 to 1965 that she is most remembered for. She was the first American to dance at Moscow’s Bolshoi Theater and the first American to dance with the Paris Opera Ballet.
She later served as artistic director for the Lyric Opera Ballet in Chicago and later founded the Chicago City Ballet, of which she was also the artistic director. She has been inducted into the National Women’s Hall of Fame, she has received a National Medal of Arts, and in 1996 she was one of five recipients of a Kennedy Center Honor for lifetime achievement for her contribution to American culture, where legendary ballet dancer Mikhail Baryshnikov paid tribute to her.
Tallchief received many accolades during her career and after her death. In 2020, Google celebrated Maria Tallchief with a Google Doodle, in 2018 she was inducted posthumously to the National Native American Hall of Fame, and the University of Oklahoma has a scholarship in her name. In Oklahoma, June 29 is Maria Tallchief Day and she is among four Native American ballerinas depicted in “Flight of Spirit,” a mural in the Oklahoma Capitol building.
