Monday’s Washington Post featured an article about the closing of Whitman-Walker’s S street location:

Hundreds who walked through the doors of the building in the 1980s and 1990s died. And then hundreds more began to live.

If a physical space can capture the arc of an epidemic, the Whitman-Walker Clinic, at the corner of 14th and S streets, occupied the front lines of AIDS in Washington for 21 years. It was there when the average life expectancy for someone with AIDS was two years, and it was there when new drugs became available that made HIV infection a manageable disease to live with.

Staff Writer Anne Hull produced a powerful piece of writing, and a revealing glimpse into our already (to many) hidden history. It’s a shame, but I never think of councilman Jim Graham in the context of his work as Executive Director of Whitman-Walker, nor do I often think about gay life as it was in this city during the 80s. As I think of the smiling faces and soaring spirits of my friends, it’s sobering to think that if we were all living 25 years prior, many of us would be dead, and the rest of us would spend our weekends attending funerals. We can only wonder where we would be as a community if our urban ghettos had not lost so much talent and energy. They could have pioneered much of the ground we now travel.

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