The U.S. Postal Service is set to honor Phillis Wheatley, the first Black author to publish a book of poetry.
Set to be officially unveiled on Jan. 29 at the Old South Meeting House in Boston, the USPS will honor the writer through a dedicated stamp.
The stamp will be part of the Black Heritage series. First introduced in 1978, the Black Heritage Commemorative Stamp series is considered to be one of the service’s longest-standing series. It was initiated to honor Black figures in U.S. history and to recognize their achievements.
Amongst the notable people were educator Booker T. Washington, abolitionist and activist Harriet Tubman, baseball player Jackie Robinson, as well as journalist and civil rights movement activist Ida B. Wells.
The USPS has also honored the 1963 March on Washington, the 13th Amendment, Kwanzaa as well as Black cinema such as “The Sport of the Gods,” “Caldonia” and “Hallelujah.”
With the latest announcement, the Phillis Wheatley stamp will join the series as a Forever stamp. It was designed by USPS art director Antonio Alcalá and features a portrait by Kerry James Marshall. Marshall has received critical acclaim for his work painting Black subjects.
“Phillis Wheatley-Peters, died, aged 31, a free woman of color, facing forward.” said Marshall per Instagram when the portrait was first released. “The image I made for this stamp sought to memorialize her, as such. That is how I chose to commemorate her legacy.”
Born in 1753, Wheatley was kidnapped and brought to Boston in 1761 by enslavers. Within 16 months, she studied literature, Greek, Latin, astronomy and geography. As a teenager, Wheatley began to write poetry. In 1767, she officially published her first poem.
By 1773, although she was in poor health, Wheatley went to London, where she met the Countess of Huntingdon, Selina Hastings. With monetary support from Hastings, she published her first book of poetry, “Poems on Various Subjects, Religious and Moral.”
The poems were critically acclaimed as they covered topics such as enslavement, religion, the American Revolution and the establishment of the country. With the publishing of the book, Wheatley became the first Black American woman and only the third American woman to publish a book of poetry.
After the book was first published, little remains publicly known about Wheatley’s life. Following marriage to John Peters in 1778, documents show that Wheatley struggled to get support for a second book, eventually getting a position in a boarding house.
On Dec. 5, 1784, the renowned poet passed away at the age of 31 due to poor health. For more than 200 years, her poems have continued to be studied by both historians and literary scholars alike.
