See also Loony (short for "lunatic"), which is sometimes spelled 'loonie'.
is the unofficial but commonly-used name for
Canada 's gold-coloured, bronze-plated, one-dollar
Coin . It bears images of a
Common Loon , a well-known Canadian bird, on the reverse, and of
Queen Elizabeth II on the obverse.
The design for the coin was meant to be a
1987 , and circulation of the one-dollar banknote was intentionally reduced at the same time to forestall any reluctance by the public to accept the new coin. As a result, the introduction of the coin was successful in achieving public acceptance in a fairly smooth fashion.
The switch occurred when
Brian Mulroney (rhymes with ''loonie'') was
Prime Minister ; hence the coin was in its early years sometimes called ''Mulroney's Loonie'' or the ''Mul-loonie'', but use of these terms has largely subsided.
The coin has become the symbol of its currency (newspapers will often discuss the rate at which the ''loonie'' is trading against the ''
Greenback ''), and as such, ''loonie'' (''huard'' in French) is a slang term for the
Canadian Dollar in general.
On occasion the coin has shown other images, for instance the
National War Memorial to commemorate VE day, and in 2005, a portrait of
Terry Fox ; it is still, however, referred to as a ''loonie''.
Special edition includes:
- , showing children and the Parliament Building. The regular ''loon'' design was also minted that year bearing the double date "1867-1992".
- in Ottawa , Canada
- , Ottawa
- athletes. See ''loonie'' Trivia for details.
- 2005: ''The Terry'', a 25th Anniversary of the Terry Fox 's Marathon Of Hope . Fox is the first ever Canadian to be featured on a circulation coin.
- logo.
The coin is made of
Bronze -electroplated
Nickel . The total composition of the coin is 91.5% nickel and 8.5% bronze; The bronze is about 88%
Copper and 12%
Tin .
In 2005, the ''loonie'' gained an
American neighbour when
Minnesota 's
State Quarter featured a
Loon , that state's official
State Bird . Like the
Canadian Dollar , Minnesota's loon also faces right with its head raised.
In recent years, the golden-colored loonie became associated with Canada's winning
Hockey and
Curling teams and has been viewed as a good-luck charm in international competition. The legend began during the
2002 Winter Olympics , when the Canadian icemaking team responsible for the ice surfaces in the
Ice Hockey Tournament had buried a loonie under centre ice. Both the
Men's and
Women's hockey teams would win gold in the tournament, the men's 50 years to the day after their last gold medal victory. Following the Games, Team Canada executive director
Wayne Gretzky recovered the coin and gave it to the
Hockey Hall Of Fame .
The legend is also prevalent in
Curling , as the
Kevin Martin rink at the same Olympics had won silver medals on a sheet with silver-colored quarters underneath the surface. At the
2006 Winter Olympics , the Canadian icemakers in the
Curling Tournament buried two loonies, one at each end of the sheet — coincidentially, the
Brad Gushue rink would win the gold medal there. In the same Olympics, the icemakers at the
Hockey Tournament announced that they would ''not'' bury a loonie under the ice — coincidentally the men's team finished out of the medals.
This legend is kept alive by the
Royal Canadian Mint , which has since issued specially-designed "Lucky Loonies" for each year the summer and winter Olympics Games are held.
- When the new coin portrait of Queen Elizabeth II was first issued in 1990, a legend surfaced that the artist had simply added the image of the so-called "King's crown" to a portrait of the Queen, and that she was never meant to be seen wearing that headgear. This is patently false; she posed personally for the portrait wearing one of her usual crowns.
