Harriet Tubman will become first African-American on U.S. currency

Harriet Tubman will become the first African-American and woman on the $20 bill, Treasury Secretary Jack Lew announced on Wednesday. Tubman will replace Andrew Jackson, the nation’s seventh president, on the currency. Tubman, who was born into slavery in the early part of the 19th century, escaped and then used the network of antislavery activists […]

Harriet Tubman will become the first African-American and woman on the $20 bill, Treasury Secretary Jack Lew announced on Wednesday.
Tubman will replace Andrew Jackson, the nation’s seventh president, on the currency.
Tubman, who was born into slavery in the early part of the 19th century, escaped and then used the network of antislavery activists and safe houses known as the Underground Railroad to transport other slaves to freedom. After the Civil War, Tubman, who died in 1913, became active in the campaign for women’s suffrage.
Last year, the treasury announced plans to replace Alexander Hamilton, the nation’s first secretary of the treasury, on the $10 bill with a woman.
But they have now decided to keep Hamilton after both Hamilton supporters and women’s groups championed for the $20 bill to be changed to incorporate a woman instead.
In the past year, Hamilton has undergone a revival in popularity, with the success of Lin-Manuel Miranda’s Pulitzer-prize winning Broadway musical named after the founding father.
Jackson, meanwhile, is a more complicated figure, and there is no doubt some symbolism in the former president – a slave owner –  being replaced by a woman who was born into slavery.
When it was announced last year that the treasury would be printing a woman on U.S. currency for the first time in history, a women’s group called Women on 20s organized a survey to select an appropriate figure.
Over the course of 10 weeks, the group collected 600,000 votes and Tubman came out on top.
The last woman featured on U.S. paper money was Martha Washington, who was on a dollar silver certificate from 1891 to 1896. The only other woman ever featured on U.S. paper money was Pocahontas, from 1865 to 1869. Susan B. Anthony and Sacagawea are on dollar coins.

Culled from dailymail.co.uk