2016 United States Mint America The Beautiful Quarters Proof Set 5 coins Grades. All five 2016 America the Beautiful Quarters proof set finish, protectively encased in a clear plastic lens and outer packaging. U.S. Mint proof coins feature sharp relief and a mirror–like background. Their frosted, sculpted foregrounds give them an exceptional cameo effect. Proof blanks are specially treated, polished and cleaned to ensure high quality strikes. The blanks are then fed into presses fitted with specially polished dies and struck at least twice to ensure sharp relief. The coins are then packaged in a protective lens to showcase and maintain their exceptional finish. The 2016 edition of the United States Mint America the Beautiful Quarters Proof Set features the seventh annual release of five quarters in the series. Each coin in this series features a common obverse (heads) with the 1932 portrait of George Washington by John Flanagan, restored to bring out subtle details and the beauty of the original model. Inscriptions are “UNITED STATES OF AMERICA,” “LIBERTY,” “IN GOD WE TRUST” and “QUARTER DOLLAR.” The 2016 reverse (tails) of these coins honor the sites below with the following designs: Shawnee National Forest in Illinois Cumberland Gap National Historic Park in Kentucky Harpers Ferry National Historical Park in West Virginia Theodore Roosevelt National Park in North Dakota Fort Moultrie at Fort Sumter National Monument in South Carolina The U.S. Mint launched the America the Beautiful Quarters Program in 2010. The 12–year initiative includes 56 quarters featuring reverse designs depicting some of our most cherished national parks and other national sites. The U.S. Mint will issue five new quarter designs per year, with one final design in 2021. The seventh year of the program, 2016, features the seventh group of five quarters in the series.