Valuable Nickel

A little 46-year-old Chicago sculptor named Felix Schlag last week gave the U. S. Treasury Department a nickel, received $1,000 in change. Sculptor Schlag's was no ordinary nickel, but a prize-winning plaster design for a new issue to be minted this fall, replacing the Buffalo-Indian head, which has lived its minimum statutory life of 25 years. The 1938 nickel will have on its heads side the profile of Thomas Jefferson, on its tails side his Monticello, Va. home. Schlag's design was chosen by Director of the Mint Nellie Tayloe Ross, Sculptors Heinz Warneke, Albert Stewart, Sidney Waugh from 390 designs which showed Jefferson standing, sitting, amused, grim, spindly, fat, and Monticello from all angles, in one case with an eagle perched on the roof.

Had Sculptor Schlag won the $1,000 sooner, it might have saved the life of his 28-year-old bride of less than a year, who died of pneumonia in March after 22 weeks' illness. Schlag, who could not afford to send her to a hospital, designed the Jefferson nickel in such time as he could spare from nursing her.

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