Sally Ride, the world's first woman astronaut, has been honored with a stamp from the U.S. Postal Service some 35 years after making history in space on the shuttle Challenger in 1983.
The Sally Ride Forever stamp was rolled out on Wednesday during a ceremony at the University of California, San Diego, where she had served as a physics professor after her astronaut career, USPS said.
Ride died of cancer in 2012.
Ride was chosen to fly in the NASA space shuttle program in 1982, saying then that after all the publicity "maybe it's too bad that our society isn't further along and that this is such a big deal," USA Today reported.
"If you read interviews from years and years back, you'll see that there was always a major frustration that she didn't comment much on 'how it feels to be the first American woman in space,'" her sister Bear Ride told NBC News. "She just didn't think that way.
"She wanted to get the job done. Her personal feelings were just that: personal. Not right or wrong — simply Sally. Everyone who knows her well really got that about her."
Ride would make another shuttle flight in 1984 and became a champion for science education and a role model for women, Space.com reported. She also served on the accident investigation boards after the space shuttle tragedies involving Challenger in 1986 and Columbia in 2003.
Ride revealed in her 2012 obituary that she was gay and was in a relationship for 27 years with Tam O'Shaughnessy, who she cofounded the Sally Ride Science educational venture with, NBC News said.
"Sally started collecting stamps when she was a girl, and she continued to do so her whole life —especially stamps of the Olympics and space exploration," O'Shaughnessy in a statement released by USPS. "Sally would be deeply honored to have her portrait on a U.S. stamp."
USPS chief information officer and executive vice president Kristin Seaver said Ride's success gave girls permission to consider non-traditional field.
"Sally Ride's history-making journey has made it easier for young girls to dream of one day being an astronaut, an engineer, a physicist or a mathematician," Seaver said. "Today, girls don't just dream. Because of trailblazers like Sally Ride, they have been empowered to do."
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