It seems appropriate that today’s #stampoftheday comes the day after Kamala Harris made her first remarks as the Democratic nominee for vice president. Issued in 1952, it’s a 3-cent stamp that honors the role of women in the armed forces. It’s today’s stamp because today is the 102nd anniversary of the day that Opha May Johnson became the first (of 300) woman to enlist in the US Marine Corps Reserve on that day.

Harris, of course is a well-known person who has held a variety of visible and important positions. Johnson is not well-known and held a variety of less visible but seemingly important jobs. But Harris is – and Johnson was – clearly talented. And like Johnson was, Harris is a trailblazer.

So who was Opha May Johnson, she and what did she do? Born in Kokomo, Ind., on May 4, 1878, she was raised in D.C. and graduated second in her class from Wood’s Commercial Business College. On Dec. 20, 1898, she married a musician named Victor Hugo Johnson. Before she was in the Marines, she worked for 14 years in the civil service in the Interstate Commerce Department as Clerk to the Quartermaster General.

When she enlisted in the Marine Corps, the US had been at war for well over a year and, needing as many men as possible to fight in Europe, including men working in administrative jobs in the Marine’s headquarters. Maj. Gen. George Barnett, Commandant of the Marine Corps, believed women could do these jobs. On August 2, 1918, he officially asked Navy Secretary Josephus Daniels, who oversaw the Marines to authorize this approach. Six days later, Secretary Daniels approved the request. Word was spread and five days later the enlistments of women began. About 300 enlisted that day; Johnson apparently was first in line.

Johnson was commissioned as a private and began working in the office of the Marine Corps’ Quartermaster General. She was among the approximately 300 women working at the Marine Corp’s headquarters who were nicknamed “Marinettes.” In September, she was promoted to sergeant, which made her the highest-ranking woman in the Marine Corps during her time in service. She was on active duty in February 1919, about four months after the war had ended. It appears she then moved into a more prestigious clerical position with at the Marine headquarters in Washington, D.C., where she worked until she retired from government service in 1943.

Johnson, who did not have any children, nephews or nieces, died on August 11, 1955 and was buried in an unmarked grave in Rock Creek Park in Washington, DC. She was largely unknown until the early 2000s when some members of the Women Marines Association began researching her story and raised money to install an obelisk at her grave that was unveiled in August 2018. At that time, Nancy Wilt, a Women Marines Association member who started researching Johnson shortly joining the organization in 2005, told Time magazine “the more I found out, the more I was in awe of her.”

Wouldn’t it be great if 100 years from now, no one needs to rediscover Kamala Harris but those who learn about her for the first time, say the more they found out about her, the more they were in awe of her.

Be well, stay safe, fight for justice and work for peace.