The United States quarter has found a new flavor: ¡Azúcar! On August 5, the United States Mint honored the Queen of Salsa with her own commemorative quarters. She is the first Afro-Latina to be featured on a U.S. coin.

Cruz was born in Havana, Cuba, studying music and acting as the lead singer of La Sonora Matancera. The Cuban singer, performer, and feminist icon moved to the U.S. during the 1960s after being exiled under the Castro dictatorship.

After moving to the U.S., Cruz’s career skyrocketed, becoming one of the most celebrated salsa artists in the world, with 23 golden albums, three Grammy Awards, four Latin Grammy Awards, and the President’s National Medal of Arts. In 2016, she was posthumously honored with a Grammy Lifetime Achievement Award.

In honor of this new achievement, Modern Muze spoke with Dr. Elizabeth C. Babcock, the Director of the Smithsonian American Women’s History Museum, to discuss the program and how it continues to highlight some of the most important women in history.

Celía Cruz is celebrated as a trailblazing Afro-Latina icon in music and beyond. Could you share more on how and why she was chosen to be featured in the American Women Quarters Program?

When the American Women Quarters program was authorized by Congress there was an emphasis that the women featured in the quarters should reflect the rich diversity of American women’s backgrounds. We worked together with the U.S. Mint on a public call for submissions, sorting, and making recommendations for final selection, of which Celia Cruz was one. She was an Afro-Latina icon as the first woman salsa star and an award-winning artist who helped make salsa a global phenomenon, which shows her lasting impact on our nation and the world.

This quarter marks an Afro-Latina’s first appearance on a U.S. coin. What does this representation mean for the Afro-Latinx community and for the broader American public?

Having Celia on a quarter is a critical moment of recognition and pride for Afro-Latinos across the country. Every day people will also be excited about the new quarter. With this quarter, Celia Cruz will be introduced to even more people. The wonderful engraving on the coin will prompt people to want to find out more about her.

The AWQP aims to honor notable women in American history. Could you provide an overview of the program and discuss its goals and the criteria for selecting the women featured?

The program was authorized by Congress with the ‘‘Circulating Collectible Coin Redesign Act of 2020’’ and runs from 2022 through 2025, with five quarters released each year. The Smithsonian American Women’s History Museum worked with the U.S. Mint and the National Women’s History Museum on a public call for submissions, sorting, and making recommendations for final selection. The women selected are from ethnically, racially, and geographically diverse backgrounds and from a variety of fields. And while the program celebrates familiar names, it also aims to introduce Americans to women whose contributions have been under-recognized.

How does the Smithsonian American Women’s History Museum contribute to initiatives like the AWQP, and what role does the museum play in preserving and promoting the legacies of influential women like Celia Cruz?

The American Women Quarters Program is a great way to document women in American history. It’s been an amazing opportunity for our museum to collaborate with the U.S. Mint in our mission of making sure that, as we think about American history, we tell it in its entirety, which includes the stories of women’s impact. In addition to helping make recommendations for the final selection, we collaborated with Smithsonian curators across the institution to make recommendations for each quarter design to the U.S. Mint illustrators.