The United States Mint has begun shipping the Christa McAuliffe commemorative coins to those who placed pre-orders earlier this year. The Proof and Uncirculated silver coin went on sale back in late January with the Mint stating at the time that orders would begin shipping on March 15, 2021. The Mint kept that date with notifications of shipment and tracking numbers provided to ordering customers. The pre-ordering process was new for the Mint on both this coin as well as the National Law Enforcement commemorative coins. This likely was to help the Mint gauge how many they really needed to produce immediately, given the exceptionally high demand for silver bullion over the past 12 months.
As a sidebar, the National Law Enforcement commemorative products are also now shipping to those who placed pre-orders.
The Proof variant of the commemorative is priced at $74.00 while the Uncirculated version will be slightly less at $69.00. For both coins there are no household limits in place for purchases and both remain available on the Mint’s website. For those who order now, shipping will be within 1-2 business days but quantities are limited.
The coin commemoratives the Mrs. McAuliffe, the first selected educator in the Teacher in Space Program in the 1980s. She, along with six other astronauts were killed during the explosion of the Space Shuttle Challenger STS-51L mission on January 28, 1986.
The Act authorizing the coin was signed by Former President Trump on October 9, 2019, just eight days after the law passed in the Senate on October 1, 2019.