SAN FRANCISCO – Sections of the AIDS Memorial Quilt will hang from the Mayor’s Balcony at City Hall on Monday, June 6, 2022, a symbolic display approved by Mayor London Breed, to ask the general public to see a free, historic display of the Quilt – the biggest ever in San Francisco – in Golden Gate Park on June 11 & 12, 2022 from 10 am – 5 pm every day.
35 years ago, then San Francisco Mayor Dianne Feinstein approved Quilt to hold from City Hall; it was the primary public display and helped launch a national movement for motion against stigma and hate.
This yr the Quilt marks 35 years for the reason that first panels were stitched together throughout the darkest days of the pandemic. It was a gaggle of San Franciscans, led by Cleve Jones, Mike Smith and Gert McMullin, who gathered with friends to start making quilt panels to recollect family members who were dying of AIDS. This act of affection and protest began a movement for motion against the stigma so many faced at such a painful time in our country.
BBC World News Witness History — The AIDS Memorial Quilt:
The Quilt was conceived in November of 1985 by long-time San Francisco gay rights activist Cleve Jones. Because the 1978 assassinations of gay San Francisco Supervisor Harvey Milk and Mayor George Moscone, Jones had helped organize the annual candlelight march honoring these men.
While planning the 1985 march, he learned that over 1,000 San Franciscans had been lost to AIDS. He asked each of his fellow marchers to write down on placards the names of friends and family members who had died of AIDS. At the top of the march, Jones and others stood on ladders taping these placards to the partitions of the San Francisco Federal Constructing. The wall of names looked like a patchwork quilt.
Inspired by this sight, Jones and friends made plans for a bigger memorial. Slightly over a yr later, a small group of strangers gathered in a San Francisco storefront to document the lives they feared history would neglect. Their goal was to create a memorial for many who had died of AIDS, and to thereby help people understand the devastating impact of the disease. This meeting of devoted friends and lovers served as the muse of the NAMES Project AIDS Memorial Quilt.
Cleve created the primary panel for the AIDS Memorial Quilt in memory of his friend Marvin Feldman. In June of 1987, Jones teamed up with Mike Smith, Gert McMullin and a number of other others to formally organize the NAMES Project Foundation.
Public response to the Quilt was immediate. People within the U.S. cities most affected by AIDS — Atlanta, Latest York, Los Angeles and San Francisco — sent panels to the San Francisco workshop. Generous donors rapidly supplied sewing machines, equipment and other materials, and lots of volunteered tirelessly.
THE INAUGURAL DISPLAY
On October 11, 1987, the Quilt was displayed for the primary time on the National Mall in Washington, D.C., throughout the National March on Washington for Lesbian and Gay Rights. It covered an area larger than a football field and included 1,920 panels. Six teams of eight volunteers ceremonially unfolded the Quilt sections at sunrise as celebrities, politicians, families, lovers and friends read aloud the 1,920 names of the people represented in Quilt. The reading of names is now a practice followed at nearly every Quilt display. Half one million people visited the Quilt that weekend.
The overwhelming response to the Quilt’s inaugural display led to a four-month, 20-city, national tour for the Quilt within the spring and summer of 1988. The tour raised nearly $500,000 for tons of of AIDS service organizations. Greater than 9,000 volunteers across the country helped the seven-person traveling crew move and display the Quilt. Local panels were added in each city, tripling the Quilt’s size to greater than 6,000 panels by the top of the tour.
THE QUILT GROWS
The Quilt returned to Washington, D.C. in October of 1988, when 8,288 panels were displayed on the Ellipse in front of the White House.
With a small seed grant from the World Health Organization, Quilt organizers travelled to eight countries to mark the primary World AIDS Day on December 1, 1988 with simultaneous displays broadcast from six continents. Throughout 1989, greater than 20 countries launched similar commemorative projects based on the Quilt. Cleve Jones, Mike Smith and the NAMES Project Foundation were nominated for the 1989 Nobel Peace Prize in recognition of the worldwide impact of the Quilt.
In 1989 a second tour of North America brought the Quilt to 19 additional cities in america and Canada. That tour and other 1989 displays raised nearly 1 / 4 of one million dollars for AIDS service organizations. In October of that yr, the Quilt (now greater than 12,000 panels in size) was again displayed on the Ellipse in Washington, D.C. HBO released their documentary film on the Quilt, Common Threads: Stories from the Quilt, which brought the Quilt’s message to tens of millions of movie-goers. The film won the Academy Award for Best Documentary of 1989.
By 1992, the AIDS Memorial Quilt included panels from every state and 28 countries. In October 1992, all the Quilt returned to the National Mall in Washington, D.C. In January 1993, the NAMES Project was invited to march in President Clinton’s inaugural parade where over 200 volunteers carried Quilt panels down Pennsylvania Avenue.
The last display of all the AIDS Memorial Quilt was in October of 1996 when the Quilt covered all the National Mall in Washington, D.C. with an estimated 1.2 million people coming to view it. The Clintons and Gores attended the display, marking the primary visit by a sitting president of america.
THE QUILT MOVES TO ATLANTA
In 2000, the Board of Directors of The NAMES Project elected to maneuver the Foundation’s national headquarters from San Francisco to Atlanta. The cross-country move was made to handle the changing face of HIV/AIDS and grow the Foundation’s partnerships, programs and financial resources.
In 2004, greater than 8,000 of the latest panels that had been received at or since October 1996 display were shown on The Eclipse in Washington, D.C. in observance of National HIV Testing Day.
In 2012, as a part of the twenty fifth anniversary of the NAMES Project Foundation, the Quilt returned to Washington, DC as a part of a collaboration with the Smithsonian Museum’s American Folklife Festival, where all the Quilt was displayed on the National Mall over the course of a two-week period with 1,500 blocks of panels being displayed every day. Given the dimensions of the Quilt, it’s now too large to be displayed abruptly on the Mall. The International AIDS Conference was held in Washington DC immediately following the display, by which the Quilt was a serious feature, with displays in greater than 60 locations throughout the D.C. metro area.
In 2013, as a part of ongoing awareness and academic efforts, a special Quilt program, Call My Name, was created to attract attention to HIV/AIDS within the Black community and the general public health crisis that also exists today. This system goals to create a greater variety of Quilt panels that reflect the impact of HIV/AIDS inside the Black community and the effect stigma and prejudice have on increased infection rates. A national tour followed that included hosting panel-making workshops organized by Black churches and community groups to make panels and raiser greater awareness of on the HIV/AIDS crisis within the African American community. You possibly can see a few of the stories from Quilt panels made honoring Black lives lost to AIDS as a part of a strong online exhibition of the Quilt during Black History Month 2020.
ENSURING THE QUILT’S LEGACY
In November 2019, the National AIDS Memorial became the everlasting caretaker and steward of the Quilt, returning it to San Francisco, where its story began throughout the height of the AIDS epidemic. At the moment, the Quilt’s archival collection of 200,000 objects, documents, cards and letters that chronicle the lives remembered in it were transferred to the celebrated American Folklife Center on the Library of Congress, making this collection available through the world’s largest public library. This announcement, made on the Library of Congress in Washington, DC, featured special guests House Speaker Nancy Pelosi, and Representatives John Lewis and Barbara Lee, who recognized the Quilt as a national treasure that have to be preserved for its ability to show for generations to come back.
“Moved by the wonder …and power of the Quilt, we again renewed our vow to finally defeat the scourge of AIDS and convey hope and healing to all those affected. Due to the tireless leadership of activists, survivors, scientists and the LGBTQ community, we won’t relent until we banish HIV to the dustbin of history and achieve an AIDS-free generation.”
U.S. House Speaker Nancy Pelosi, (D-SF), June 5, 2021
Today, the Quilt stays a strong symbol of hope, love and activism that could be a powerful teaching tool for health and social justice, with sections of its 50,000 panels traveling to tons of of communities every year to boost awareness concerning the problems with health and social justice.
This chance provides a visible reminder to the general public to come back see the Quilt on display on June 11th & 12th in Golden Gate Park. Rarely does the Quilt get displayed outdoors on this size and variety of panels.
The last time it was displayed with this many panels in San Francisco was in 1988 on the Moscone Center.