FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE
Contact: Ed Corley, Director of Development
Phone: (207) 774-6877, x8013
Email: ecorley@peabodycenter.org
FRANNIE PEABODY CENTER & VICTORIA MANSION
PARTNER FOR WORLD AIDS EVENT
5-7 p.m., Thursday, December 1st 2011
In a unique collaboration, Frannie Peabody Center will partner with one of Portland’s most historic landmarks, Victoria Mansion, to hold its annual World AIDS Day reception and vigil from 5 to 7 p.m. on Thursday, December 1st. The event will be highlighted by a reading and talk from John-Manuel Andriote, author of the recently re-released Victory Deferred: How AIDS Changed Gay Life in America and culminate in a candlelight vigil on the mansion steps, weather permitting.
Each year clients, supporters, volunteers and community leaders around the world gather in a variety of ceremonies and special events to recognize World AIDS Day, a day marked for remembering those lost to the epidemic and honoring the progress made in the thirty years since the epidemic began. This will be the first time Frannie Peabody Center has held World AIDS Day at Victoria Mansion, which will be completely decorated for the holidays.
John-Manuel Andriote originally published Victory Deferred in 1999. Compelled by his own 2005 HIV diagnosis, Andriote revisits his chronicle of the AIDS epidemic in the updated and expanded edition of the University of Chicago Press 1999 hardcover original. Victory Deferred tells the story of how a health crisis pushed a disjointed jumble of local activists to become a nationally visible and politically powerful civil rights movement. Based on hundreds of interviews with those at the forefront of the epidemic, Victory Deferred blends personal narratives with institutional histories, including FPC, to show how AIDS forced gay men from their closets and ghettos into the hallways of power to lobby and into the streets to protest.
“What an incredible night this is going to be,” says Patti Capouch, FPC’s Executive Director. “Last year’s World AIDS Day event proved to us that we have turned a corner in the epidemic: that people want to remember but that they also want to feel healthy, motivated and part of a larger community. John-Manuel’s story is one the community needs to be reminded of and his life-affirming message is one everyone should hear. I can’t think of a better setting for event than the beautiful Victoria Mansion.”
Frannie Peabody Center, Maine’s largest HIV/AIDS service organization has offices in York and Cumberland Counties and serves over 400 people living with HIV/AIDS in Maine as well as provides prevention services for at-risk populations.
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For more information on the event or Frannie Peabody Center, please contact Ed Corley, Director of Development, at (207) 774-6877, x8013 or email him at ecorley@peabodycenter.org.
