“There is no reason for us to feel shame for who we are. We were born into this world exactly as we are. We are who we were meant to be.” ~Stacy Park Milbern
Stacey Park Milbern was a powerful advocate for people with disabilities and the first Korean American featured on a U.S. coin. She overcame many physical and social challenges in her life, never letting them break her. She was an infectiously joyful woman who helped create the disability justice movement and worked hard to break the negative stigmas around disabled individuals.
Milbern was born at an army hospital in Seoul, South Korea, but grew up at Fort Bragg in North Carolina. Her father was an American, serving in the military, and her mother was Korean. Milbern was born with congenital muscular dystrophy (CMD), a group of genetic disorders that are characterized by muscle weakness apparent near birth. Symptoms include low muscle tone, tightness of the ankles, hips, knees, and elbows, respiratory problems, and more. Despite her physical disability, Milbern didn't identify as disabled when she was a child. She started using a manual wheelchair and scooter in middle school, switching to a power chair in high school, but would always just say she was challenged, not disabled.
Even though Milbern didn't initially accept her disability, there were many experiences throughout her childhood that helped her strengthen her awareness of her body and embrace the condition she had. She realized she had a different reality from most of her peers when she noticed they were all struggling with vastly different things. In middle school, her classmates were concerned with many issues one might think “typical” of their age – like crushes and puberty – while Milbern struggled to walk. In high school, Milbern had to start using a trach and ventilator. That was a transformative experience for her, which led to her finally identifying as a disabled person.
This new understanding of her identity prompted Milbern to seek out and engage with other disabled individuals. She had a lot of leadership experience from school, which made her comfortable speaking in front of large crowds and with public figures. She used these skills as she started focusing her efforts toward building lasting change for her community. By the age of 16, Milbern was serving on multiple North Carolina commissions, was fighting to get disability history added to school curriculums, managed a blog named "Crip Chick," co-founded the North Carolina Youth Leadership Forum, was appointed to the North Carolina Statewide Independent Living Council, and was the community outreach director for the National Youth Leadership Network. She had also been instrumental in writing and passing the North Carolina law establishing October as Disability Awareness Month. When she was 18, she helped coin the term "disability justice," which further defined her advocacy work.
As she got older, Milbern longed for independence and wanted to live on her own. Unfortunately, her disability made moving out more complicated due to her need for assistance with many daily tasks. But in 2011, she made the solo move to the Bay Area in California. The Bay Area is known as one of the most accessible places for people with physical disabilities and was also the historical center of the disability rights movement. There, she was able to live on her own because California rates high in spending for in-home care benefits. Because of this, she could get Medicaid support for an in-home attendant. That assistance allowed her to gain some independence and remain active in her community.
In California, Milbern founded the Disability Justice Culture Club, which worked to organize and promote her vision of a fully inclusive disability justice movement. She was also the director of multiple programs at the Center for Independent Living and continued to write, speak, and organize for the disability justice movement while earning her Master's degree and working in human resources. She also worked to advocate for fair medical care for individuals with disabilities and defended the necessity of Medicaid funding home care programs.
As Milbern continued to advocate for people with disabilities, she was presented with more opportunities to make an even bigger impact. In 2014, she was appointed to the President's Committee for People with Intellectual Disabilities. She also co-formed Power to Live, an inclusive activist group that focused on helping people like her, older disabled people of color, especially those in the LGBTQIA+ community. Power to Live served their community in 2019 when the state shut off power to thousands of residents to combat wildfires. The collective delivered supplies, generators, ventilators, etc., ensuring everyone who needed power to live was cared for. Milbern also had the incredible opportunity to be the impact producer for the 2020 Netflix film Crip Camp: A Disability Revolution. She was able to provide valuable insights that helped shine a light on those often overlooked, and the film was nominated for an Oscar.
In 2020, as the COVID-19 pandemic hit many nations around the world very hard, Milburn noticed how disabled and homeless people were being disproportionately affected. She raised concerns about the well-being of her communities and warned the public that the pandemic's demands on health services would affect the disabled community, cutting off their access to the services they needed. She worked with other advocates to organize, create, and distribute disease prevention kits to these heavily impacted communities.
The design for the Stacey Park Milbern Quarter was discussed at the October 24, 2023, Citizens Coinage Advisory (CCAC) meeting. Jean and Joel Milbern, Stacey's parents, and Jessica and David Milbern, Stacey's siblings, were all in attendance to share their thoughts on the design. They shared that Milbern was a confident woman who radiated joy wherever she went, so they were happy to see that conveyed in this portrait. They told the committee that they believed she would have liked how she was portrayed in this design and that she would have appreciated her posture and clothing. They loved that her wheelchair was included in the design. She was not a woman ashamed of her disability, and she wouldn't have wanted it to be hidden on the coin. The family appreciated how accurate the image was, especially regarding her hand on her trach, showing she was speaking. They also explained the importance of including her middle name, Park, and the term Disability Justice. Her middle name was a connection to her Korean heritage, which she was so proud of, and the term disability justice was a reference to the movement she helped found.
The committee felt that she deserved to be front and center of the design because she was a woman who overcame many challenges and was consistently at the forefront of whatever she did. There was some concern that this design's wording might overpower her image, but they ultimately recommended it because the family felt so strongly that this was what Milbern would have chosen.