ABSTRACT
In October 1996 the NAMES Project AIDS Memorial Quilt was displayed for the fifth time on the Capitol Mall in Washington, D.C. Conceived by Cleve Jones in February 1987 as a memorial to friends, acquaintances, and loved ones who had died from complications due to AIDS, it had been viewed for the first time in Washington that year. Nine years later, it had grown from its original count of 2,000 quilts to over 40,000, taking up a space of twenty-eight acres, comparable to twenty-five football fields. Of all the tributes to people who have died from AIDS, none have become more visible—even unavoidable—than this icon of late twentieth-century American culture.
