New US Postal Service stamp honors Holocaust survivor and humanitarian Elie Wiesel

The Wiesel stamp, which is set to be released on Sept. 17, features a 1999 black-and-white photo of Wiesel by Sergey Bermeniev along with his name and the word “Humanitarian.”

By Grace Gilson, JTA

The United States Postal Service announced a new series of stamps honoring Nobel Peace Prize winner and Holocaust survivor Elie Wiesel.

Wiesel, who died in 2016 at the age of 87, is the 18th person to be honored in the USPS’ Distinguished Americans stamp series.

“The 18th stamp in the Distinguished Americans series honors humanitarian Elie Wiesel (1928-2016), a survivor of Nazi concentration camps whose dozens of works bore witness to the Holocaust and whose resilience and compassion continue to be a source of inspiration,” a description for the stamp on the USPS website reads.

As a teenager, Wiesel was sent with his father, Shlomo, to the Buna Werke labor camp in the Auschwitz complex.

He went on to become an international human rights advocate, publishing several books, essays and educational projects, including “Night,” a 1960 memoir about his experience during the Holocaust.

Wiesel was also awarded the Presidential Medal of Freedom, the Congressional Gold Medal, the National Humanities Medal and the Medal of Liberty in the United States.

Wiesel joins several other notable Jews featured in the Distinguished Americans series, including Jonas Salk, who developed the first influenza and polio vaccines, Pulitzer Prize-winning novelist and playwright Edna Ferber and Albert Sabin, who developed the oral polio vaccine.

Jewish author and illustrator Shel Silverstein and Supreme Court Justice Ruth Bader Ginsburg have also been featured on stamps, and the postal service has issued several stamps marking Hanukkah.

The Wiesel stamp, which is set to be released on Sept. 17, features a 1999 black-and-white photo of Wiesel by Sergey Bermeniev along with his name and the word “Humanitarian.”

It will be used for a less common category of mail, two-ounce mail, and will always be valid for the rate printed on it, according to USPS. A sheet of 20 stamps is available for pre-order for $21.40.