Our thanks to a very generous collector, Kuniaki Hiraki in Japan, who has been very kind to share his knowledge and pictures of these coins with us from his excellent web site.
It could be that the last of the 25th Anniversary medals or "pressed pennies" have been released at the Tokyo Disneyland Resort. Starting their fifth year are the extremely popular Tokyo Disneyland Coins of the Month. Just like clockwork, Tokyo Disneyland coins of the month are onstage the first day of the month, replacing the previous month's coins. Engraving that is currently the best of any Disney park and lots of coins that celebrate park events, what more could a pressed penny collector ask for?
On the night of April 14, 2009, the 25th Anniversary "pressed pennies" or medals were removed from stage and replaced by new coins. This change alone introduced 45 new medals on just one day! We have already noted the three Coins of the Month and other coins introduced over the first two weeks of April, 2009 plus two Spring Carnival coins on the 22nd and on April 28th, 24 new coins were issued, six at each of four Tokyo Disney Stores! Although the Disney Store coins do not have the same high quality engraving as most coins inside the Disneyland Resort, they are neat Disney collectibles and we will be adding a guide for them. With the recent additions, the total number of new Japanese Disney "pressed pennies" or medals for the month of April, 2009 will be 79!
Here are the latest coins.
We'll add them to the Tokyo Disneyland Souvenir Guides (ディズニー・スーベニアメダル) as soon as we have coins in hand to scan.
Happy collecting,
Boomer and the folks at ParkPennies.com
Editor's note: We are often reminded that the preferred numismatic term is "Souvenir Medals". However, some rebellious ParkPennies.com contributors are known to use more casual, fun terms like: elongated coins, pressed pennies, flattened, crushed, squashed, rolled, mashed, smashed, stamped, squished, smushed, stretched, memory, keepsake, and souvenir medallions to describe these fun penny souvenirs.