2017-S Frederick Douglass, NIFC

The 2017-S Frederick Douglass, NIFC carries Thomas Cleveland's reverse honoring the Frederick Douglass National Historic Site in Anacostia, Washington, D.C., where the abolitionist, orator, and statesman lived from 1877 until his death in 1895. The design renders Douglass at his writing desk with the U.S. Capitol visible through a window behind him, a composition that anchors the figure in the city he made his political home after the Civil War. San Francisco struck 1,078,981 pieces for the issue, the standard 2017 NIFC print and the third of the year's four catalogued NIFC entries. The S-mint coins shipped through Mint Uncirculated Coin Sets and two-roll bag products, never entering Federal Reserve channels.

Authentication on the issue runs through the finish rather than the design. The coin is a business strike, not a proof, so the surfaces show cartwheel luster across the fields rather than mirrored proof reflectivity, and the S mintmark above Washington's head is the only mintmark difference from the P and D circulation strikes. Strike quality concentrates the grading discussion on Douglass's facial detail and the small Capitol dome behind him; full strikes show readable lapel folds on the figure and visible columns on the Capitol portico. The clad composition (75% copper-nickel over a pure copper core, 5.67 grams, 24.26 mm) matches every quarter struck since 1965, and PCGS, the Professional Coin Grading Service, and NGC certify the issue with S attribution. Counterfeit risk at the date level is functionally nil.

The coin is a Regular-classification issue, and its place in the NIFC run is shaped by the design's historical weight rather than any production-driven scarcity. The roughly 1.08-million print figure puts the date well below the 130-million-plus range of the P and D circulation outputs but sits comfortably above demand for the standard NIFC business strike, which keeps high-grade examples available and prices grounded. Series collectors completing the 56-design NIFC subset pick the issue up raw from broken Mint Sets or in MS67 certified slabs, with the Douglass biographical anchor giving the date marginally firmer registry interest than the year's two more abstract designs. For the broader story of the ATB program and the NIFC collector-only product line, see the Washington ATB series history.