Generation AIDS: Minnesota’s HIV/AIDS Crisis

In July 1981, the New York Times published an article about a mysterious illness plaguing gay men in New York City. After reading the article, Bruce Brockway, a gay activist and publisher of the Twin Cities' first LGBT newspaper, turned to his partner and said, "I think I have that." That was AIDS and Bruce was right. Numbers-wise, Minnesota was never a hot zone of infection. But for the Minnesotans living with HIV/AIDS, the struggles were the same: to stay alive and to fight the homophobia that wanted to ignore an epidemic dismissed as a gay man's disease. This is their story, reported and narrated by KFAI's Britt Aamodt. Five years into the epidemic, people living with HIV/AIDS were still dying of it in increasing numbers and the President of the United States had yet to acknowledge the crisis in public. In Minneapolis, as in other cities, activists were now taking control of the conversation through organizations like ACT UP. Individuals did what they could to help people living with HIV/AIDS survive long enough for that hoped-for cure. These samaritans included a leather-clad anthropology professor with a knack for cooking and a young doctor with a big idea. But would there be a cure? The lives of David Bjork, Rene Valdes and Michael Reinbold depended on it. KFAI's Britt Aamodt shares part two in our Generation AIDS series. KFAI's Britt Aamodt produced this two-part audio documentary. (Archival audio courtesy of Twin Cities Public Television, WCCO, NBC, CBS and ABC. Photo courtesy of Alan Lessik.)

Alan Lessik