The Bismarck Civic Center might have been the hardest place to ask a bystander for change for a dollar on Wednesday, even though there were enough quarters there to overflow several vending machines.

Some of the only people swapping quarters for cash were workers helping the U.S. Mint sell thousands of shiny new North Dakota quarters adorned with two grazing bison, the Badlands and a sunset.

Officials estimated that 3,400 people came to the event, which included music, appearances by dignitaries and a history lesson.

"What an energetic crowd," Medora Musical singer Levi Andrist said. "Those kids screaming was just like at a Class B basketball tournament."

Many schoolchildren took field trips to the event, including Erik Hruby, an eighth-grader at St. Mary's Elementary School in Bismarck.

Erik, like hundreds of kids, received a free quarter when the event concluded.

"It's awesome. I'm never going to sell it," Erik said.

Lt. Gov. Jack Dalrymple, who was chairman of the North Dakota Quarter Commission, kicked off the event.

The commission took hundreds of comments from citizens on what they wanted the design to be. The choices were eventually narrowed down to the buffalo and a pair of Canada geese flying in the air. The commission took a vote in May 2005 to accept the buffalo design.

"Eventually, I think that everybody came to accept that this was truly the best choice for us," Dalrymple said.

David Lebryk, acting director of the U.S. Mint, said the mint will produce between 500 million and 600 million North Dakota quarters and will never produce them again after that. Lebryk said in a few weeks, the quarters will be widely circulated all over the United States. The North Dakota quarter is the 39th one minted so far under the Mint's 50 State Quarters program. The Mint releases four quarters a year in order of when states were admitted to the union. The last quarters will come out in 2010.

There also was an appearance by the 26th president, Teddy Roosevelt, who was played by interpreter Clay Jenkinson.

Speaking as Roosevelt, Jenkinson said he spent a lot of time in the Badlands between 1883 and 1887 and even shot a buffalo in the Badlands.

"It was here that the romance of my life began," Jenkinson said.

Gov. John Hoeven told the audience that Wednesday would be a day they will always remember and will tell their kids about.

"From our first inhabitants, to the Corps of Discovery and beyond, North Dakota truly has a legendary history," Hoeven said. "Our state quarter will be a great symbol to showcase our state for generations to come."

Once the formal event concluded, people stood in a long line to buy $10 rolls of quarters and special commemorative sets that contained two uncirculated quarters - one made in Denver and the other in Philadelphia.

Dina Butcher, who served on the quarter commission, was one of the people buying rolls of quarters.

"There's such a mystique about the buffalo," Butcher said.

(Reach reporter Tom Rafferty at 223-8482 or tom.rafferty@bismarcktribune.com.)