Wednesday was an exciting day for the staff at Homestead National Monument.

Mark Engler, superintendent of Homestead, learned that the park had been chosen as the featured Nebraska site for the America the Beautiful National Park Quarter Series through an e-mail that came a minute or so before the United States Treasury called him to make it official.

The new quarter will give Homestead the chance to share the history and importance of the Homestead Act with the world, he said.

“We’ve put (the announcement) on our Web site and made sure it was up on our electronic message board,” Engler said shortly after 9 a.m., when the selection was posted on the U.S. Mint’s Web site.

Homestead was one of four sites Gov. Dave Heineman forwarded to the U.S. Treasury for consideration. Other sites selected for the honor were Scotts Bluff National Monument, DeSoto National Wildlife Refuge, and Niobrara National Scenic River.

“U.S. Mint officials made a great choice in adding Homestead National Monument to this new series of quarters, Gov. Heineman said.

“With the signing of the Homestead Act, the landscape of Nebraska and other western states changed forever. In Nebraska, the Homestead Act helped transfer nearly 45 percent of our land to pioneers who helped settle communities all across our state. It also led to the creation of more than 100,000 new farms that helped establish Nebraska as one of our nation’s leading agricultural states.

“Homestead National Monument is an excellent choice for this new series and a fitting representation of our great state.”

The next step in the process will be to develop a design that encompasses the importance of Homestead National Monument. Artists and designers from the U.S. Mint will work closely with the park to find the right design for the commemorative coin, Engler said.

“We are going to work through the process to find a design that will encourage people to find out more about Homestead National Monument and the Homestead Act,” Engler said. “This will help people understand how important the Homestead Act was to American history.”

The Nebraska coins will be the 26th of 56 coins slated to be released. Beginning in 2010, the U.S. Mint will release five coins each year. Nebraska’s will go into circulation in 2015.

The program follows the popular State Quarter Program that began in 1999. During that program, there were 594.4 million Nebraska coins minted. Nebraska’s state coin was released in 2006.

That kind of circulation will open a whole new world of opportunities for the entire state, not just Gage County, the town of Beatrice or Homestead National Monument, Engler said.

“Homestead will literally be in the hands of hundreds of millions of people,” he said during an interview in July.

The coins’ release dates are based on when the chosen site first became a part of the National Park System. Homestead National Monument joined the park system in 1936.

The first five coins will commemorate Hot Springs National Park in Arkansas, followed by Yellowstone National Park in Wyoming, Yosemite National Park in  California, Grand Canyon National Park in Arizona and Mount Hood National Forest in Oregon. 

For more information about the America the Beautiful Quarters, visit http://www.usmint.gov.