A World Time line of Nickel in Coins

• 170 B.C.: First nickel coin produced
• 1751: Swedish scientist Baron Axel Frederic Cronstedt, discovered nickel as an element
• 1850: Switzerland--Nickel was used in modern coinage for the first time

  Composition: 55 percent copper, 20 percent nickel, 25 percent zinc and added silver

Other countries soon followed the Swiss example and started to add nickel to their coins:

• 1856: United States--first used nickel for their flying eagle 1 cent (copper nickel)
• 1861: Belgium--first regular issue of nickel-copper coins
• 1864: Peru
• 1865: Costa Rica--1 centavo copper nickel
• 1869: Jamaica--20 percent alloy until 1906
• 1871: Chile
• 1873: Germany--cupro-nickel 5 pfennig
• 1874: Colombia--copper nickel 11/4 centavos
• 1876: Egypt
• 1878: Nicaragua--copper nickel: 1 centavo
• 1882: Brazil
• 1882: Mexico
• 1883: Bolivia--copper nickel 5 centavos
• 1883: Serbia
• 1884: Ecuador--1/2 centavo copper nickel
• 1888: Bulgaria
• 1889: Japan
• 1889: San Salvador
• 1892: Austria-Hungary--pure nickel coin
• 1893: Greece
• 1894: Italy
• 1894: Hungary
• 1896: Venezuela
• 1897: Haiti
• 1897: Martinique
• 1898: Siam (Thailand)
• 1899: Argentina
• 1900: Crete
• 1900: Guatemala
• 1900: Paraguay
• 1900: Persia (Iran)
• 1900: Portugal
• 1900: Romania
• 1922: Canada
  
  
• By 1939, over one hundred countries had coinage containing nickel