Oberlin College alums featured on U.S. stamps

Class of 1884 Oberlin College alumnae Anna Julia Cooper and Mary Church Terrell, two of OC's earliest African-American women graduates, will be inducted into the United States Postal Service's (USPS) Civil Rights Pioneers and Black Heritage stamp series.

The February release of the Civil Rights Pioneers stamp collection will feature Terrell, among other civil rights leaders. In June, Cooper will become the 32nd inductee into the USPS's Black Heritage stamp series.

Both stamps will be available for purchase at local post offices, online at www.usps.com/shop, or by phone at 800-STAMP-24 (800-782-6724).

Terrell was a journalist, activist, educator, and driving force behind the African-American women's suffrage movement. Born in 1863 in Memphis, Tenn., to former slaves, Terrell earned a bachelor's degree in classics at Oberlin College in 1884 and a master's degree four years later. She was among the first black women to graduate from Oberlin college, and while here she made her mark, writing for and editing the Oberlin Review newspaper, which is still in publication.

Terrell worked at Wilberforce College for many years as a professor and principal. Her tireless work on education issues led to her appointment to the District of Columbia board of education, on which she served from 1895 to 1906; she was the first African-American woman to be so appointed. While still teaching and maintaining a prosperous career as a journalist, Terrell served as the first president of the National Association of Colored Women's Clubs and founded the National Association of College Women. She was the only African-American woman invited to take part in the 1904 International Congress of Women, and she was one of two female founding members of the National Association for the Advancement of Colored People.

The six designs of the 42 cents Civil Rights Pioneers commemorative stamps will be issued Feb. 21.

Cooper was an educator, scholar, feminist, and activist who gave voice to the African-American community during the 19th and 20th centuries. She tirelessly fought for social justice and civil rights for African-American women, young people, and the poor through her scholarship, community outreach, and innovative educational leadership.

Cooper, who once described her vocation as "the education of neglected people," viewed learning as a means of true liberation. She is best known for her educational leadership, her challenges to the racist notion that African-Americans were naturally inferior, and her 1892 groundbreaking collection of essays and speeches, "A Voice from the South by a Black Woman of the South." In it, she urged readers to take an active role in liberating themselves and others from racism and sexism in order to realize their fullest potential.

Born into slavery around 1858 in Raleigh, N.C., Cooper developed a love of learning early in life. She entered Oberlin College in 1881 and earned a degree in mathematics in 1884. Eight years later, she published "A Voice from the South," the first book-length volume of black feminist analysis in the United States. She later studied French literature and history at Columbia University before transferring to the Sorbonne in Paris in 1924; a year later she became the fourth African-American woman ever to earn a Ph.D. and the first black woman from any country to do so at the Sorbonne. While furthering her studies, Cooper taught full time at various schools throughout the United States, teaching (and later acting as principal) at the largest and most prestigious public high school for African-Americans in the nation, M Street High School in Washington, D.C., now known as Dunbar High School.

The 42 cents Anna Julia Cooper stamp, which will be available in June, features a portrait of Cooper created by Kadir Nelson, who based his painting on an undated photograph.