Today in History—October 11: The AIDS Memorial Quilt Goes on Display

After his best friend died of AIDS, activist Cleve Jones channeled his grief into a sewing project that became the AIDS Memorial Quilt.

On this day in 1987, his handiwork—along with that of many others—was first exhibited in Washington, D.C., on the National Mall.

Jones lived in San Francisco, long known for its thriving gay community. As the AIDS crisis emerged in the early 1980s, San Francisco was hard hit.

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By 1985 almost everyone Jones knew was dead or dying. That year he helped organize a candlelight march to honor those who had lost their lives. Homophobia was rampant, with homosexual men being blamed for what was becoming a global public health threat. Marchers wrote the names of their loved ones on placards and taped them to a wall. Jones thought it looked like a patchwork quilt.

Then, in 1986, he lost his companion, Marvin Feldman, to AIDS. Jones began sewing a quilt panel to honor him. He wanted the media to know that there were human beings—friends, family members, neighbors—behind the statistics.

Jones asked others to join him in creating a memorial and cofounded the NAMES Project Foundation. Eventually the quilt grew to include 1,920 panels, each measuring 3 feet by 6 feet, the same size as a grave.

The AIDS Memorial Quilt was displayed during the second National March on Washington for Lesbian and Gay Rights. When the quilt was unfolded, it was larger than a football field.

Each panel held the name or initials of someone who had died. Some panels named more than one person. Among those memorialized were actor Rock Hudson, entertainer Liberace, and lawyer Roy Cohn. One panel named two brothers; another panel honored a mother and her two-year-old son. Panels also featured decorations that included hearts, rainbows, sequins, a Star of David, a chef’s hat, a chorus line of dancers, teddy bears, and a panda.

After that first display, the AIDS Memorial Quilt kept adding panels. By 2012, the quilt’s 25th anniversary, it had become too big to display on the National Mall. In 2020 the National AIDS Memorial completed a digitization project so that anyone can view the quilt online. It is considered the world’s largest community arts project.