The national mints of the United States and Canada are each issuing commemorative coins to celebrate Black History Month for 2024.
In January, the United States Mint announced it would release $5 gold, $1 silver, and half-dollar Harriet Tubman coins to acknowledge the ongoing 200-year commemorations of Tubman’s birth.
Images on the new coins illustrate scenes of episodes from Tubman’s life. One coin depicts Tubman holding forth her hand in a gesture showing that she is willing to assist you and take you with her. Another coin shows her leading others across a bridge to freedom, while a third shows a confident Tubman in the foreground with an illustration behind her of the Civil War’s Combahee River Raid of 1863. Tubman led 150 African American soldiers during this military raid that led to the liberation of 700 enslaved Black people.
A famed anti-slavery advocate and Underground Railroad “conductor,” Tubman was born in 1822 in Dorchester County, Maryland, to Harriet Green and Benjamin Ross, who could both trace their ancestry to the Ashanti (Asante) people of Ghana. She was given the name Araminta Ross. At some point in 1844, married a free Black man named John Tubman and adopted Tubman’s last name. She later changed her own first name to Harriet, in honor of her mother.
Tubman liberated herself from slavery in July 1849 and returned to Maryland at least 13 times over the following 10 years to bring some 70 other family members and friends to freedom.
“Harriet Tubman spent her life actively pursuing freedom and social justice for all,” the catalog for the U.S. Mint proclaims. “As one of the most recognized figures of the Underground Railroad, she guided around 70 people to freedom during her time as a conductor. She then went on to serve as a nurse, scout, and even a spy for the Union Army during the Civil War. After the Civil War, until her death in 1913, she lived a life committed to freedom, women’s suffrage, and dignity for all people. In recognition of the 2022 Bicentennial of her birth, this groundbreaking commemorative program will showcase Harriet Tubman’s life reflected in unique designs in gold, silver, and half-dollar coins.”
“Every coin produced by the United States Mint helps to tell a story that teaches us about America’s history or connects us to a special memory,” said Ventris C. Gibson, director of the Mint, in a press release. “We hope this program will honor the life and legacy of Harriet Tubman and inspire others to learn more about this amazing woman.”
The Royal Canadian Mint, which circulates Canadian coins, will commemorate Black History Month with silver coins honoring the Amber Valley, Alberta, community. Canada, which also celebrates its Black History Month throughout February, will remember the African American families from the U.S. Oklahoma and Texas areas who accepted the Canadian government’s promise of free land in western Canada and established the Pine Creek settlement (later renamed Amber Valley) in the early-20th century.
“Amber Valley was the only Negro settlement to survive both World War I and the Great Depression,” wrote Robin W. Wink in the book “The Blacks in Canada: A History” (McGill-Queen’s University Press, 1997). “Some three hundred Oklahoma Blacks moved into the Pine Creek area, one hundred miles north of Edmonton…beginning in 1910…Leaving their families in Edmonton for the first winter, the men—led by Jefferson D. Edwards, a young man of twenty-two—accepted from one to five sections each. While a few were able to find abandoned claims on which improvements already had been made, most needed two years or more to harvest their first crop. During the winters they returned to Edmonton to work in a meat-packing plant. The settlers opened a school which served as their Methodist church as well. By 1920 the average holding at Amber Valley consisted of thirty-eight acres—virtually all in crops––three horses, two cattle, and houses and fences valued at $400, which although low was deemed sufficient by the local authorities.”
The pure silver Amber Valley coin shows several Black families arriving at the Pine Creek settlement and getting ready to carve out a new life in early-20th-century western Canada. “I appreciate the recognition this coin represents,” Myrna Wisdom, historian and co-founder of The Black Settlers of Alberta and Saskatchewan Historical Society, said in a statement. “The Black Settlers of Amber Valley are indeed deserving of this recognition, which includes both my paternal and maternal grandparents, as well as my parents.”
Surcharges from the sale of Harriet Tubman Commemorative Coins will benefit the National Underground Railroad Freedom Center in Cincinnati, Ohio, and the Harriet Tubman Home, Inc., in Auburn, N.Y. The coins are available from the U.S. Mint’s online store (https://catalog.usmint.gov/) or can be purchased at their headquarters in Washington, D.C., and their gift shop in Philadelphia, PA. The Royal Canadian Mint’s 2024 $20 Amber Valley Fine Silver Coin is available by calling 1-800-268-6468 in the U.S. or visiting www.mint.ca.
The coins are cute, but they are far from the rightful place of her image being on the twenty dollar bill.
More of us need to be aware of Jackson’s demonic legacy.