Republished courtesy of Geoff Butler
Canadian Historical Sites, Memorials, Monuments, and Museums
Sudbury, Ontario, is one of the wealthiest geological areas in the world. The city, located in the Canadian Northern Shield, possesses numerous minerals along the Sudbury basin, including nickel, copper, cobalt, gold, silver, platinum, and palladium deposits.
Located on the grounds of the Dynamic Earth Science Museum stands a replica of a 1951 Canadian Nickel. The monument stands nine metres (30 ft) tall and weighs 13,000 kilograms (14 tons). It is made of 94% stainless steel, 3.5% copper, and nickel and is said to be one of the world’s largest coins. The Big Nickel is approximately 64,000,000 million times the average size of a Canadian nickel.
Constructed in 1964 at the cost of 35,000 dollars, the Big Nickel was the idea and creation of Sudbury firefighter and entrepreneur Ted Szilva. In 1963, the City of Sudbury, and the Sudbury Canada Centennial Committee, initiated a contest asking the community for suggestions in celebrating the upcoming Canadian centennial. Szilva proposed building a giant replica of a five-cent coin, an underground mine and a science centre. Szilva’s idea and proposal were rejected by the committee.
In 1996, Ted Szilva wrote, “The Nickel was to show where our wealth came from, the rock, and a lasting tribute to the men and women who processed minerals in the Sudbury basin.”
Pursuing his dream, Szilva found a site (large hill) and purchased land between Sudbury and Copper Cliff. However, the city refused to grant him a building permit or road access after he had taken ownership of the land. Szilva, in turn, met with the president of INCO and acquired a piece of land that enabled access to his property. Needing funds to make his dream a reality, Szilva started a fundraising campaign and had a series of commemorative coins struck, representing each monument erected in the park. He named the site the Canadian Numismatic Centennial Park.
By December 1963, Szilva had attained enough monies to proceed, and he chose the 1951 Canadian Nickel as his centrepiece, calling it ‘The Big Nickel.’
Canadian artist Steven Tranka designed the 1951 Nickel. “The coin was issued to commemorate the 200th anniversary of the isolation of nickel as an element by Swedish chemist Baron Axel Frederick Cronstedst in 1751.”Local artist and sign manufacturer Bruno Cavallo brought the nickel design to life.
Initially, along with the Big Nickel, the park featured a number of numismatic monuments, including replicas of Canadian and American Pennies, a 20-dollar gold coin and an American Kennedy half a dollar.
On July 27, 1964, the park officially opened. In 1965, an underground mine was added, attracting close to 100,000 visitors yearly. Over time, many of the original coin monuments were dismantled. In 1981, Szilva sold the property to Science North, who refurbished the Big nickel in 1984. In 2001, the Big Nickel was dismantled, refurbished once again and temporarily moved to Science North. Thankfully it was relocated, in 2003, to its original site, becoming part of Dynamic Earth, a hands-on science center.
BIG NICKEL FAST FACTS:
- The Big Nickel is the largest coin in the world.
- In the 1960s, the Big Nickel was joined by four other over-sized monuments: The Fantasy Penny, The Lincoln Penny, The Kennedy Half Dollar and The Twenty Dollar Gold Piece. These other four monuments were all dismantled in 1984.
- The 1951 5-cent coin was minted to commemorate the 200th anniversary of the isolation and naming of the element Nickel.
- On the “heads” side is King George VI, and on the “tails,” a stylized nickel refinery with one large stack. However, it is not the Sudbury superstack!
- It is about 64,607,747 times the size of a real Canadian nickel.
- Since 1999, the composition of the 5-cent coin has changed to 94.5% steel, 3.5% copper, and only 2% nickel.
(Facts courtesy of www.sciencenorth.ca)
