This
commemorative
silver coin is one piece from a set of six, which were issued to celebrate the Olympic sporting achievements of some
of Australia's best athletes. The series is called Olympic Heritage and was released in celebration of Australia's century
long participation in the Olympic games. The six coins were released in pairs over three years from 1994-1996. This coin
pays tribute to Betty Cuthbert and was released in 1996 and paired with Shirley Strickland. In 1994 Australia's first gold
medallists Edwin Flack and Sarah Durack were commemorated and in 1995 it was the turn of Dawn Fraser and Murray Rose who
are Australian athletes and living legends. The coins were struck into silver with a fantastic frosted reverse finish. This
was the first set of silver coins issued by the Royal Australian Mint and the series is a popular one.
The reverse of this coin was designed by Horst Hanhe and depicts Betty
Cuthbert performing her Gold Medal winning sport, running. She is posed in mid stride and the legend BETTY CUTHBERT is written
between her feet. On the outer circle the legends read AUSTRALIA'S GREATEST OLYMPICS on the top and the denomination 10 DOLLARS
is bellow. The obverse features the Raphael Maklouf portrait of her Majesty
Queen Elizabeth and the
legend
running around the outer circle reads ELIZABETH II AUSTRALIA 1996. The first pair that was released from the set was
issued in a plush green presentation box with space to house the additional four coins to complete the set. This also included
a booklet entitled AUSTRALIAN OLYMPIC ROLL OF HONOUR which contains a complete list of the Australian Olympic medallists
from the year 1896 until the year the first coins of the series was issued, 1994. A Certificate of Authenticity was also
included and contained a short biography of each of the athletes featured in the series.
Betty Cuthbert AM, MBE born in 1938 won the Olympic gold medal a total of 4 times during her career as an adult and even
more impressively she won three of them in the same year.
(Sporting Heroes, 2013)
Betty Cuthbert, full name Elizabeth was interested in athletics from a young age and was always a talented short distance
runner. However, it was breaking the 200m world record in Sydney in 1956 that really made the world sit up and take notice
of her. She won the race in 23.2 seconds. It was at this point that it was realised that she was a real Olympic medal contender,
and she certainly was. Later that year she took home the gold medals for the 100m, 200m and 4x100m relay. She became an instant
Australian heroine and was known from then as "The Golden Girl." Cuthbert faced great pressure and expectation over the following
few years and it wasn't until 1964 that she managed to make a come back winning the Olympic gold medal once again after changing
to the 400m race.
Find out what dealers are paying with a subscription.
