5 Dollars Montréal Olympics, Kingston and Sailboats

One of fourteen silver coins issued by the Royal Canadian Mint to finance the 1976 Montréal Games, this piece belongs to the sailing series tied to the Kingston, Ontario venue — where the Olympic regatta was held on Lake Ontario. The programme was controversial from the start: the coins were sold at a premium well above melt value, and sales projections consistently fell short, leaving organizers scrambling as construction costs ballooned toward what became a $1.5 billion deficit that the province of Québec was still servicing into the 2000s.