The United States Mint has unveiled the design for its quarter honoring the Rev. Pauli Murray, the first Black woman to be ordained a priest in the Episcopal Church and a renowned activist for racial and gender rights. The quarter will be one of five new designs that will be issued in 2024 as part of the U.S. Mint’s American Women Quarters program, which celebrates the contributions of women to American history.
The Rev. Pauli Murray was the first Black woman ordained an Episcopal priest. Photo/Courtesy of the Carolina Digital Library and Archives/University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill
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Murray, who was ordained in 1977, was also a lawyer, academic, poet and co-founder of the National Organization for Women, the largest feminist activist organization in the United States. As a civil and women’s rights lawyer, she was appointed by President John F. Kennedy to serve on the 1961 – 1963 Presidential Commission on the Status of Women.
Murray and a friend were arrested in Virginia for refusing to give up their seats to white passengers on a bus 15 years before Rosa Parks did the same in 1955, prompting the Montgomery bus boycott in Alabama.
The Episcopal Church celebrates Murray’s feast day on July 1. Murray, who was queer, was often the only Black woman in positions she held. Murray’ contributions to the civil rights movements in the 1960s were often overlooked, though she’s been credited in landmark Supreme Court cases addressing racial and sex-based issues.
A U.S. quarter honoring the Rev. Pauli Murray will be issued in 2024. Photo/Courtesy of U.S. Mint
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The reverse (tails) side of Murray’s quarter depicts a portrait of Murray within the shape of the word “hope.” A line from Murray’s poem “Dark Testament,” which characters hope as “a song in a weary throat,” is inscribed in the design. The obverse (heads) side depicts a portrait of President George Washington.
