In 1926, at age 95, he appeared before a Senate committee, requesting that the government issue a commemorative coin that could be sold to raise money for markers to show where the Trail had been.

The coin had originally been thought of by Idahoans, led by Dr. Minnie Howard, seeking to further preservation work at Fort Hall; Meeker broadened the idea.

In the middle years of the 19th century, before the completion of the transcontinental railroad in 1869 made travel easier, hundreds of thousands of people journeyed along the Oregon Trail to settle the Far West of the United States.

He took his ox team and wagon across the nation to publicize his cause, parking his rig in front of the White House where he met President Theodore Roosevelt.

In the succeeding years, he traveled the route by oxcart, automobile, and, at age 93 in 1924, airplane, attempting to further his cause, and seeking federal recognition and funding for his efforts.

[3] The idea was sparked by the issuance of the 1925 Stone Mountain Memorial half dollar, which caused Mabel Murphy, wife of an Idaho newspaperman, to propose to her husband the striking of an Oregon Trail coin, the profits from which could be used for historic preservation.

[10] The bill authorizing the Oregon Trail Memorial half dollar was first introduced in the House of Representatives on January 25, 1926, by Washington Congressman John Franklin Miller, who had previously been mayor of Seattle.

[18] According to numismatists Anthony Swiatek and Walter Breen in their encyclopedia of US commemoratives, the bill passed "possibly because the stated purpose was nationalistic rather than obscurely local".

[19] Coin dealer and author Q. David Bowers states that "on the surface the motivation seemed to be good enough ... doubtless many American citizens had family ties to the famous migration".

[21][22] The Association initially contacted Chester Beach, credited with the design of the 1923 Monroe Doctrine Centennial half dollar, to sculpt the new coin, but he was unavailable, though he prepared sketches.

Ulric Stonewall Jackson Dunbar, who had played a minor role in the Columbian half dollar of 1892–93, was willing, but lacked the national reputation the Association felt the coin's sculptor needed.

[25] The Association determined upon a design concept of a map showing the Oregon Trail on one side, and on the other a man leading an ox-drawn wagon, with his wife and infant child riding.

[19][30] The Indian side designed by Laura Fraser features a dramatically rendered Native American, standing erect with outstretched arm in what Vermeule describes as a gesture of peace.

"[19] Such statements were made from the time of issue; The Numismatist in November 1926 stated that the Indian's left hand "is upraised as if warning the people of the East of the perils and hardship of the Trail".

[2] The Native American wears a headdress, has a blanket and bow, and is superimposed on a map of the United States, with a line of Conestoga wagons heading west.

[36] The Oregon Trail Memorial half dollar thus became the first commemorative coin struck at multiple mints; Bowers notes that this set "a precedent which would be expanded and abused in the years to come".

[29] Meeker continued his exploits: he was presented with 97 coins on his birthday in December 1927 by the Association[38] and brought his half dollars to the visitor's gallery of the New York Stock Exchange, though he was refused permission to go onto the floor.

He was able to return home, disgruntled at having missed voting in the election (he supported the successful Republican candidate, Secretary of Commerce Herbert Hoover, for president) for the first time since 1853.

[45] Most 1928 Oregon Trail Memorial half dollars remained in the hands of the Treasury for several years after their striking, though the Association purchased an estimated 1,000 for sale to the public.

[46] The OTMA had a financial crisis in 1931, and was planning to close its doors, but operations continued, with headquarters moved from its Manhattan office to Driggs's home in Bayside, Queens.

[47] In early 1933, Driggs sought the issuance of more half dollars on behalf of the OTMA, writing to the acting Mint Director, Mary Margaret O'Reilly.

These actions have been interpreted negatively by numismatic scholars: Q. David Bowers alleges that Scott's representative, Wayte Raymond, proposed melting most of the issue to create an artificial scarcity, and that the company "desired to capitalize on the gullibility of collectors and their need to complete sets by having more varieties coined.

Scott figured that if additional Oregon Trail half dollars could be minted with the date 1933 they could be sold effectively at the Century of Progress Exposition held that year in Chicago.

"[36] Swiatek and Breen noted, "through God only knows what manner of political manipulation, the Oregon Trail Memorial Association managed to obtain approval of a new 1933 Denver issue" for sale at the exposition.

[53] Other reasons have been postulated for the lack of an issue in 1935: in a 1937 monograph quoted by Bowers, early coin dealer B. Max Mehl speculated that it took Scott two years to dispose of the 1934-D pieces.

O'Reilly and other officials did not immediately answer and Driggs wrote again in March 1936, Chaffin, again acting superintendent at Philadelphia, responded that the dies had been prepared and sent to San Francisco.

[36] In June 1936, Herbert G. West, head of the Whitman Centennial Celebration, wrote to Driggs informing him that his group had sought and failed to gain (unusually for 1936) a commemorative half dollar to finance its activities.

Driggs was non-committal, first telling West that he hoped they might still be successful in gaining their own half dollar, and then that a special issue would be difficult to get as the mints had shut down for the summer.

[60] A letter to the editor in the September 1943 issue of The Numismatist stated that the group was selling the pieces at $5 to finance stakes made of Oregon wood with which to mark the Trail.

After 1954, when the last such pieces were struck, the Treasury Department did not again support a non-circulating commemorative until 1982, when a half dollar in honor of the 250th anniversary of the birth of George Washington was issued.