Community News

Dr. Mary Edwards Walker will be honored by the United States Mint by having her likeness engraved on a coin in 2024.

Walker was a Civil War-era surgeon, abolitionist and women’s rights activist who is also the only woman to be awarded the Medal of Honor. She was born in 1932 in the Town of Oswego, and is buried in Rural Cemetery.

The announcement was made at a press conference held on Wednesday afternoon at the Oswego Town Hall by George Demass, town historian. He said that he had been contacted previously by representatives from the U.S. Mint, but that the official news was released just this week. “Dr. Mary Walker will be honored along with four others in the American Women Quarters 2024 commemorative coin issue. She will be joined by former congresswoman Patsy Takemoto Mink, poet Pauli Murray, Native American writer/composer Zitkala-Sa (Red Bird) and Latin musician Celia Cruz,” Demass said.

The four year American Women Quarters Program was begun by the U.S. Mint in 2022. It will honor five pioneering women each year until 2025. The women being honored are from ethnically, racially and geographically diverse backgrounds.

Demass said that a committee is being formed to prepare for the launch of the Dr. Walker quarter. “We will have representatives from the town, city and county of Oswego as well as various historical societies, Fort Ontario and other local residents,” he said. “We hope to have quite a celebration to commemorate Dr. Mary Walker’s achievements.”

Dr. Walker was honored in 2022 when the U.S. Department of Defense renamed an Army base for her. Fort A.P. Hill in Virginia, previously named for a Confederate Civil War general, is now called Fort Walker. Dr. Walker was known for caring for the wounded on the battlefield, and even across enemy lines. She was captured as a prisoner of war in Virginia. Her portrait was also issued on a postage stamp in a 1982 issue commemorating Medal of Honor recipients. Demass said, “She was a guest in every President’s office from Abraham Lincoln through Woodrow Wilson.”

During the program on Wednesday, Mr. Demass said he had been contacted by U.S. Mint representatives several years ago about the plans for the coin issue. “They wanted to contact Dr. Walker’s family, and I was able to put them in touch with her great-great-great nephew, Tom Worden who lives in Washington state,” he said. “I have known Tom for many years, and he was happy to help.”

Demass continued, “Dr. Mary Edwards Walker was a great American. The inscription on her statue states ‘I have got to die before people know who I am and what ai have done. It is a shame that people who lead reforms in this world are not appreciated until they dead. Then the world pays its tributes…’”