Before 1857 one cent coins were made of large amounts of pure copper and almost the size of modern half dollar coins.  Because of the rise in the price of copper and the decrease in the value of cents, due to inflation, the United States Mint decided to reduce the size of the cent.  This gave America two sizes of cents, the large and small ones.  To reduce the use of copper even further the United States Mint also decided to make cents from an alloy of copper and nickel.  This alloy made the cent much lighter in color compared with the bronze cents.  To show what the composition of the new metals would look like some half cents were minted with the new alloy.