First lady Michelle Obama, Oprah Winfrey and others joined PMG Megan Brennan at the dedication of the Maya Angelou stamp April 7 in Washington, DC.
“She’d get a big kick out of this moment — being honored and commemorated by the Postal Service with her own stamp for the big, bold, bodacious life she dared to live, in a way that dazzled and gave meaning to those of us who knew her and many who didn’t,” Winfrey told the audience.
She also recited “Phenomenal Woman,” one of Angelou’s poems.
The PMG praised Angelou as an “author who broke down the barriers of literary form. She committed her life to ideas that elevated our sense of what it means to be human and to advance understanding, compassion and reconciliation.”
Angelou’s son, Guy Johnson, said his mother “left a stamp on everything and everyone she touched. It’s only fitting the Postal Service is bringing out a stamp in recognition of her life’s work.”
Other participants included former ambassador to the United Nations Andrew Young, Rep. Danny Davis (D-IL) and artist Ross Rossin, whose lifelike painting was used on the stamp.
The stamp can be purchased online and at Post Offices nationwide.
