Bobbi Campbell

Born in Georgia in 1952 Bobbi Campbell earned a degree in nursing from the University of Washington and volunteered at The Seattle Counseling Services for Sexual Minorities, the first gay-run counseling service for gay people in the country, He lived communally in Capitol Hill with other gay male activists at what was known informally as the "East John Street Gay Men's Collective", described by his former lover Tom Richards as "a notorious and famous house with colorful and smart people." Campbell moved from Seattle to San Francisco in 1975, getting a job in a hospital near The Castro and immersing himself in the political and social life of the community, == Diagnosis and local activism ==

Starting with a case of shingles in February 1981, Bobbi Campbell suffered a succession of unusual illnesses, including leukopenia later that summer. and now known to be closely associated with AIDS. He was formally diagnosed as having KS by dermatologist Marcus Conant on October 8, 1981. After speaking with Randy Alfred, a friend and editor of the San Francisco Sentinel, Campbell agreed to write a column "to demystify the AIDS story". Campbell joined the Sisters of Perpetual Indulgence In February 1982, on the invitation of Conant and Volberding, and persuaded reluctant physicians to allow him to meet and counsel AIDS patients at Conant's KS clinic. == The People With AIDS Movement ==

In 1982, Campbell and Turner convened a meeting that spawned People With AIDS San Francisco, he drafted the Denver Principles, the defining manifesto of the PWA Movement,—and the Denver Principles represent a "careful synthesis" of these two positions: The activists—in an echo of the Lavender Menace radical feminists storming the NOW convention stage in 1970—decided to storm the stage of the closing session of the Second National AIDS Forum in order to present the Denver Principles. As each of the 11 men read out one of the 11 statements, they did so with the "Fighting for our lives" banner behind them, from the San Francisco march earlier that month; these words became the slogan of the PWA Movement. After the conference, Campbell flew to New York with Callen, Berkowitz and Artie Felson, organizing and planning for local and national PWA organizations on the plane. On arrival, they organized a PWA organization in the city despite initial opposition from the Gay Men's Health Crisis. They also planned a national PWA organization which opened in New York City in June 1984. PWA-New York went on to create the first safer sex poster to appear in a gay bathhouse in the city. In June 1984, the annual San Francisco's Gay Freedom Day Parade was dedicated for the first time to people with AIDS. Dykes on Bikes have led the parade since the mid-1970s and People With AIDS followed immediately behind. == Wider activism ==

Initially, there was very little coverage of the AIDS crisis outside the gay community—while 1982 saw 800 reported cases and 350 AIDS-related deaths in the US, there were only 6 stories about AIDS on major network news and print media up to May 1983 included little coverage beyond the gay press and the San Francisco Chronicle After being criticized for omitting any coverage of a Madison Square Garden benefit in April 1983, The New York Times increased its coverage of AIDS, setting the tone for an increase across print media.—only the second time an openly gay man had appeared on the cover of a mass-market news magazine, The following week, with Callen, Berkowitz, Felson and Turner, attendant media had little to cover beyond Campbell with a sign reading "Dan White's homophobia is more deadly than AIDS," Campbell gave one of his last speeches at the National March for Lesbian and Gay Rights when the 1984 Democratic National Convention was held in San Francisco in July. He was introduced as a feminist, a registered Democrat and a Person With AIDS; he had served as a board director of the National AIDS Foundation and on the steering committee of the Federation of AIDS-related Organizations, founded the National Association of People With AIDS and testified in front of Congressional subcommittees. Campbell told the crowd that he had hugged his boyfriend on the cover of Newsweek, and then kissed Hilliard on stage "to show Middle America that gay love is beautiful," criticizing the Christian right for using scripture to justify their homophobia. After criticising the lack of progress being made by the Reagan administration, he held 15 seconds of silence for the 2,000 who had died of AIDS at that point "and [for] those who will die before this is over," before laying out a series of concerns for politicians to address—including increased funding for both research and support services and a warning of the potential for discrimination with the advent of a test for HTLV-3 (now known as HIV)—and appealing to all candidates in the upcoming elections to meet with people with AIDS. Two weeks later, Campbell appeared on CBS Evening News in a live satellite interview with Dan Rather. While the rumors and fear of AIDS had reached a mainstream audience, the facts had not yet, so Campbell was placed in a glass booth, with technicians refusing to come near him to wire up microphones for the interview. == Death and legacy ==

in front of the Washington Monument A few days after the DNC speech, another case of shingles left scars across his head; His body was taken back to Washington state and interred at New Tacoma Cemetery in Tacoma, Washington. Campbell had kept a journal throughout his life; Angie Lewis arranged for the journal to be donated to the UCSF Archives and Special Collections. The 1985 Lesbian/Gay Freedom Day Parade was dedicated to Campbell, "for the work he did as a Person With AIDS, and as a symbol for all of us who continue to fight against the threat that AIDS poses to our survival." In the 1993 docudrama TV movie And the Band Played On, adapted from Randy Shilts's book of the same name about the early days of the AIDS crisis, Campbell was played by Donal Logue. Campbell was portrayed by Kevin McHale in the 2017 docudrama miniseries When We Rise written by Dustin Lance Black to chronicle the gay rights movement. The name "Bobbi Campbell" and the names of several other key figures of the time were featured in the American Mock Trial Association's 2007–08 National Case Problem, albeit in a fictional case, unrelated to Campbell's life. == References ==