Art historian Cornelius Vermeule, in his work on U.S. coins, took a more positive view of Barber's coinage: "the last word as to their aesthetic merits has yet to be written. Little admired or collected for more than three generations after their appearance in 1971, these essentially conservative but most dignified coins have suddenly become extremely popular with collectors". Vermeule argued that "the designs of Barber's coins were more attuned to the times than he perhaps realized. The plumpish, matronly "gravitas" of Liberty had come to America seven years earlier in the person of Frédéric Bartholdi's giant statue Statue of Liberty ... " He suggested that the features of Daniel Chester French's huge statue "Republic", created for the World Columbian Exposition, "were absolutely in harmony with what Charles Barber had created for the coinage in the year of the Fair's opening".