1 Dollar - Elizabeth II Regalskeppet Vasa

The Vasa sank on her maiden voyage in August 1628, roughly 1,300 meters into Stockholm harbor, killing as many as 30 of those aboard. The Swedish warship was grotesquely top-heavy — a second gun deck had been added late in construction on the orders of King Gustav II Adolf, and no one with authority dared tell him the design was fatally compromised. She sat on the harbor floor for 333 years before being raised in 1961, intact enough to become the centerpiece of a dedicated Stockholm museum.

Cook Islands issued numerous collector-oriented dollar pieces during this period under licensing arrangements common to small Pacific island administrations generating revenue through numismatic programs rather than circulation.