100 Francs Pierre and Marie Curie

This coin was issued the year before France retired the franc entirely, making it among the last commemorative silver francs struck before the euro transition rendered the denomination obsolete. The Curies are an unusual joint honoree — Marie remains the only person to have won Nobel Prizes in two separate scientific disciplines, and Pierre's own 1906 death under a horse-drawn cart in Paris ended what might have been an even more decorated career.

The Monnaie de Paris had struck a Marie Curie commemorative once before, in 1984, for the centenary of her birth.