Next Set of U.S. Commemorative Quarters to Feature National Parks

Oregon: Crater Lake National Park and Mt. Hood National Forest

The Oregon state quarter features Crater Lake National Park, a water-filled collapsed volcano that is stunningly beautiful. Oregon's Mt. Hood National Forest will also be featured on an upcoming coin, when it becomes the first national forest minted in the new America the Beautiful series.

Crater Lake National Park has a rhapsodic description on the National Parks Service Website: "No place else on earth combines a deep, pure lake, so blue in color; sheer surrounding cliffs, almost 2,000 feet high; two picturesque islands; and a violent volcanic past. It is a place of immeasurable beauty, and an outstanding outdoor laboratory and classroom."

The deepest lake in the U.S. at 1,943 feet, and the seventh-deepest in the world, it sits in a caldera -- the remnants of a volcano that once smoldered in the Cascade Mountain Range.

Mount Hood National Forest

Just outside Portland, Ore. lies Mt. Hood National Forest, stretching over more than 1 million acres south from the Columbia River Gorge to the Olallie Scenic Area. The landscape is a playground of forested mountains, lakes and streams and the Olallie high lake basin.

One of the oldest national forests, it was one of seven carved out of the Cascade Range Forest Reserve, established in 1893 (it took its current name in 1924.) The U.S. National Forest system was established in 1891 with a swipe of President Benjamin Harrison's pen, after Los Angeles residents grew concerned about the harm being done to the watershed in the San Gabriel Mountains that supply the city with drinking water.

At Mt. Hood National Forest, you can fish, camp, boat, hike, hunt, ski, pick berries, chop down a Christmas tree ... or try to pose for the portrait that will appear on a new national park commemorative quarter in 2010.

New York: Statue of Liberty National Monument

The New York state quarter features the Statue of Liberty National Monument, a universal symbol of freedom sitting in New York Harbor.

The statue (her full name is "Statue of Liberty Enlightening the World") was a gift of friendship from the people of France to the people of the United States and is located on a 12-acre island. Dedicated on October 28, 1886, the statue was designated as a National Monument in 1924 and restored for her centennial on July 4, 1986.

Closed for nearly eight years following the 9/11 attacks on New York, the Statue of Liberty re-opened for visitors on July 4, 2009.

Nebraska: Chimney Rock National Historic Site

The Nebraska state quarter features Chimney Rock National Historic Site, which is not only an iconic feature of the American West, but a symbol of westward expansion along the Oregon Trail.

The rock has "come to symbolize the greatest voluntary migration in the history of mankind," as the National Parks Service puts it. Though it's a national historic site, the monument is administered and operated by the Nebraska State Historical Society.

Colorado: Rocky Mountain National Park

The Colorado state quarter features the Rocky Mountains, which include Rocky Mountain National Park, one of the most visited national parks in the U.S. (with 2.9 million visitors annually).

The Rockies make other U.S. mountain chains seem like hills, and the park features 60 mountains that top out above 12,000 feet. Colorado's mountains take your breath away -- literally, at that altitude -- but they hide equally stunning alpine wildflower meadows, pristine lakes and streams, and impressive wildlife, like bighorn sheep. The Colorado River headwaters are in the park, as is the Continental Divide.

The original acreage of the park was designated in 1916 by President Woodrow Wilson (one of the greenest presidents in U.S. history), and the park now stands at 416 square miles. It is ringed by national forests, expanding the protected wilderness around the park.

Many roads become impassible in winter, making late spring, summer and early fall the best times to visit.

North Dakota: Badlands National Park

The North Dakota state quarter features Badlands National Park, a 244,000-acre expanse of sharply eroded buttes, pinnacles and spires.

As impressive for the life that lives there now -- bison, bighorn sheep, endangered black-footed ferrets, and swift foxes on the grass prairies -- as the life that died there millions of years ago, the Badlands are a striking assemblage of natural grandeur. The park has the world's richest fossil beds dating to the Oligocene, 37-28 million years ago, and the fossils there tell the evolutionary story of several charismatic species, like the horse and the rhinocerous.

Missouri: The Gateway Arch

The Missouri state quarter features the Gateway Arch in St. Louis, which is part of the Jefferson National Expansion Memorial, managed by the National Park Service.

Besides standing as an iconic American structure, the Gateway Arch is a symbol of the country's westward expansion in the 19th century, to President Thomas Jefferson's role in supporting that expansion and to Dred Scott, a slave whose lawsuit seeking freedom in a St. Louis court wound up at the Supreme Court in 1857, where it is remembered as a pivotal (and shameful) decision that promoted the continuance of slavery.

Washington: Mount Rainier National Park

The Washington state quarter features Mount Rainier National Park, which could have its own coin soon. The U.S. Mint plans to produce new quarters in the order in which the federal government became stewards of the land. Created in 1899, Mount Rainier was the fifth in the National Parks system.

At 14,410 feet, Mount Rainier is the highest peak in the Cascade Range -- but it's not the only volcano visible from the park. Mount St. Helens, Mt. Adams, Mt. Baker, and Glacier Peak are all visible on a clear day -- as is Mt. Hood on a clear day. (Or, if you have the 2010 Oregon national park quarter in your pocket.)

South Dakota: Mount Rushmore

The South Dakota state quarter features Mount Rushmore National Memorial, featuring the carved faces of presidents George Washington, Thomas Jefferson, Theodore Roosevelt (the grandfather of the national parks) and Abraham Lincoln (whose own laudable environmental legacy is overshadowed by his Civil War leadership).

Some iconic American landscapes are born, and others are made.

Guzon Borglum, who carved the monumental sculpture, said: "A monument's dimensions should be determined by the importance to civilization of the events commemorated. We are not here trying to carve an epic, portray a moonlight scene, or write a sonnet; neither are we dealing with mystery or tragedy, but rather the constructive and dramatic moments or crises in our amazing history."

Michigan: The Great Lakes

The Michigan state quarter features the Great Lakes. While the Great Lakes themselves are not national parks, there are nine National Park properties managed by the National Parks Service in the Great Lakes region, including three in Michigan:

• Apostle Islands National Lakeshore, which includes 21 islands and 12 miles of mainland on Lake Superior in Wisconsin.
• Grand Portage National Monument in Minnesota, which features the histories of native American tribes as well as the people involved in the North American fur trade.
• Indiana Dunes National Lakeshore, which offers beautiful views of Lake Michigan and its wildlife from the Indiana shore.
• Isle Royale National Park, a Lake Superior island in Michigan, is one of the nation's least-visited national parks, it's also one of its most pristine, remote and beautiful.
• Mississippi National River and Recreation Area, established in 1988, includes 72 miles of the Mississippi River in Minnesota, stretching from Dayton and Ramsey to Hastings.
• Pictured Rocks National Lakeshore, which features a 40-mile stretch of Michigan's Lake Superior beach, including sandstone cliffs, sand dunes, waterfalls, lakes and forests.
• St. Croix Scenic Riverway, which includes 252 miles of of kayaking, wildlife watching and angling splendor on both the St. Croix and Namekagon rivers in Minnesota and Wisconsin.
• Sleeping Bear Dunes National Lakeshore, which features a 35-mile stretch of Michigan's Lake Michigan shoreline, including North and South Manitou Islands ... and the namesake dunes, of course.
• Voyageurs National Park, a water-based park on Minnesota's border with Canada, features ... water, and lots of it in a number of interconnected lakes (none of them Great Lakes, but all surely great in some respect).

With approximately one-fifth of the world's freshwater, of course, the Great Lakes are a national treasure, even if they aren't officially a park.

Coin photos are by U.S. Mint. Park photos are by National Park Service, with one exception. The photo of Mt. Hood National Forest is by Andy Barrett via Wikimedia Commons.

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