Stacey Park Milbern’s family, program partners, and two traditional Korean fan dancers from DI DIM SAE Korean Traditional Art Institute at the event
On Wednesday, August 13, disabled people and allies gathered at the National Museum of American History to celebrate the release of a new quarter depicting Stacey Park Milbern, a leader of the disability justice movement. She is the 19th woman honored as part of the American Women Quarters Program, which celebrates the accomplishments and contributions made by women throughout American history.
The event’s program partners included the United States Mint, National Museum of American History, American Women’s History Museum, Access Smithsonian, Asian Pacific American Center, Disability Cultural Center at Georgetown University, and the American Association of People with Disabilities (AAPD). Many of the partners tabled for the first hour of the event.
Stacey Park Milbern, whose Korean name was Park Ji-hye, led and strengthened the modern Disability Justice movement. She had congenital muscular dystrophy and died on May 19, 2020, on her 33rd birthday. She was an activist, writer, speaker, and movement organizer who focused on the issues faced by queer and Black, Indigenous, and People of Color (BIPOC) disabled people.
Milbern founded the Disability Justice Culture Club, “a collective of disabled and/or neurodivergent QTBIPOC rooted in Disability Justice, cultivating joyful resistance and interdependent community in East Oakland, [California].” She centered intersectionality and community in everything she did.
The event spotlighted Milbern’s meaningful work in the disability community. She was involved with many different organizations and organizing groups, including AAPD. Milbern participated in the AAPD Summer Internship Program in 2007, interning for Senator Tom Harkin’s Disability Counsel, Lee Perselay, on the Senate Health, Education, Labor, and Pension (HELP) Committee.
She later worked as Director of Programs at the Center for Independent Living in Berkeley, California, and as an Impact Producer for the documentary Crip Camp. President Barack Obama appointed Milbern to the President’s Committee for People with Intellectual Disabilities.
“I came to the event tonight because I’m really passionate about disability history and the way that learning our history can bring us closer together as a community in the present and can teach us tools that we’re going to need for the future,” said Emma O’Neill-Dietel, a graduate student in history at University of Massachusetts Amherst and a 2024 recipient of AAPD’s NBCUniversal Tony Coelho Media Scholarship.
The program began and ended with a traditional Korean fan dance performed by DI DIM SAE Korean Traditional Art Institute to honor Milbern’s Korean heritage. Beth Ziebarth, Director of the Smithsonian’s Office of Visitor Accessibility, then welcomed attendees to the event and introduced Dr. Elizabeth Babcock, Director of the Smithsonian American Women’s History Museum.
“These coins help tell the story of our nation through the remarkable women that helped shape it, and we’re proud to help lift up stories like Stacey’s, stories that haven’t always been included but deserve to be known,” Babcock said.
Babcock continued, “This quarter that we’re celebrating tonight is a visible and tangible way that you can hold in your hand to honor her life and her work and to bring awareness and attention to the causes that she advocated so strongly for, and to connect us all through community.”
Milbern’s parents and siblings gave remarks on what this honor meant to their family. They shared a few examples of the many ways Milbern devoted herself to disability justice: she advocated for power companies to protect disabled people during power outages, formed an emergency response network during the peak of the COVID-19 pandemic, visited people with disabilities in institutions, and provided support as they transitioned to community living.
Stacey Park Milbern’s sister Jessica Milbern discussed her sister’s lasting impact.
“The ripples [Stacey] created are still moving through the people she helped, the ideas she challenged, and the lives she changed, as commemorated by celebrations such as this. I believe if we keep those ripples going through our words, actions, and the way we lift each other up, Stacey will always be here, making the world more hopeful and more full of possibility,” she said.
Greg Dawson, Associate Director of the Office of Strategy and Performance at the United States Mint, spoke more about the American Women Quarters program. He discussed the quarter’s design, as imagined by Elana Hagler and sculpted by Craig Campbell.
“The Stacey Park Milbern quarter design depicts Milbern in action, speaking to an audience, one hand resting near her trach and the other stretched out palm-up in a gesture meant to evoke a genuine exchange of ideas and the building of allyship. The design captures Milbern’s authenticity and reminds us that her voice was not just symbolic. It was strategic, thoughtful, and vital in building a more inclusive world,” he said.
Enlarged version of the quarter depicting Stacey Park Milbern
Program participants then joined Dawson on stage as 2000 quarters were poured into a display featuring a traditional Korean serving table and serving tray that Milbern used as a child. The United Mint has shipped the Milbern quarters to Federal Reserve Banks and coin terminals nationwide, with plans to produce 300 million to 700 million coins in total.
Ziebarth moderated a panel about disability justice featuring Yomi Young, former Executive Director of the Center for Independent Living in Berkeley, California, where Stacey worked, and Michelle Banks, Co-founder and Artistic Director of Visionaries of the Creative Arts (VOCA).
Young talked about all that Milbern taught the world.
“Stacey taught us that we deserve a vibrant and just future, a world built on intersectionality, a world where we see the whole of each person’s identity and how oppression intersects, a world led by the most impacted, because those of us who are closest to the problem carry the wisdom to solve it,” she said.
“As amazing and wild as this coin is, this coin is not Stacy’s legacy. It is a spark. It’s a question in someone’s hand, in someone’s own purse. It’s a question that somebody will get this coin and say, ‘Who is she?’ And the answer will take them straight to her vision for organizing her liberation dreams,” Young continued.
Attendees described the event as meaningful, hopeful, and exciting. For many, Milbern’s quarter is not the final step in commemorating her life, but a new beginning.
Mia Ives-Rublee, who leads the Disability Justice Initiative at the Center for American Progress, contributed a recorded video about Milbern’s impact that played during the event. Ives-Rublee told AAPD, “[Wednesday’s event] is just another example of how her ethos continues to echo into the future. She helped pave the way forward for crips like me and other people who live at the intersections of intersections.”
“I am excited that we get to celebrate the joy, community care, and wisdom of Stacey Park Milbern as a community, and hope that the quarter is an invitation to everyone to learn more about her life and disability justice work,” said Dr. Amy Kenny, Director of the Disability Cultural Center at Georgetown University.
Suzanne Richard, Co-founder and Artistic Director of Open Circle Theatre, spoke about the significance of seeing Milbern on a US quarter as a fellow disabled woman. “In a capitalist society, we are no longer charity, we’re part of the currency,” she said.
Maria Town, AAPD President and CEO, discussed what this coin meant to her as Milbern’s friend.
“Witnessing the U.S. Mint release a quarter with Stacey’s likeness on it was yet another reminder of how much I miss her and how much I wish she were still physically here,” Town said. “Stacey envisioned so many different possibilities, but I am not sure that she would have ever envisioned that she would be put on currency, especially as someone who was anti-capitalist. The moment also felt hard as disabled people are having resources stripped away from them now.”
Even while acknowledging the challenges people with disabilities are facing in this current moment, Town is hopeful about what the coin will do for the disability community.
“I left the event excited, thinking of all of the people who will learn about Stacey and disability justice for the first time as a result of these quarters, and just like she did in life, Stacey will facilitate folks’ connection to community and their embrace of dreams they did not previously think were possible.”