AIDS Remembrance Garden records

The AIDS Remembrance Garden in Highland Park is a living memorial for individuals in the Rochester area who died of AIDS. The garden was conceived in the early 1990s as a place of hope, healing, and remembrance by William "Bill" Callahan and Jane Howe, both of whom lost loved ones during the 1980s AIDS epidemic.

By early 1991, Callahan and Howe had gathered a group of volunteers interested in developing an AIDS memorial park. This group included Marian Sunderland, whose son had died of AIDS. Another volunteer, Rev. Paul Walker, served as the group's liaison with the Greater Rochester AIDS Interfaith Network (GRAIN). On March 13, 1991, GRAIN agreed to sponsor the AIDS memorial park with the volunteers serving as the steering/guiding committee for the project. GRAIN supported the project until it merged with the AIDS Remembrance Garden in 1997. Walker led the guiding committee's meeting on April 25, 1991. Callahan served as committee chair from May until June 1991. Howe served as chair following the organization's first elections in June 1992 until the mid-1990s. Sunderland served as treasurer for an unspecified term during the 1990s.

On February 21, 1991, the volunteers met with Dean Spong of the Monroe County Parks Department for an initial planning meeting. On April 23, 1991, Sprong led the group through two potential sites for the memorial garden in Highland Park. The group unanimously decided to adopt the second location: a then undeveloped area of the park near the future site of the Vietnam Veterans Memorial. Spong would continue to serve as an advisor and liaison with the Parks Department during the initial planning and landscaping phase of the project. The Parks Department maintained the site following the intial surveys and landscaping.

In June 1991, the committee formally named the project the AIDS Remembrance Garden. The project would be funded by private donations and public grants as a gift to the community of Rochester and Monroe County. Fundraising and planning continued throughout 1991 and 1992 with the Monroe County Legislature approving the plan for the site in the summer of 1992. In September 1992, the committee approved the final site plan prepared and presented by Environmental Design & Research, P.C.

On May 16, 1993, over 200 people gathered in Highland Park for a groundbreaking ceremony for the AIDS Memorial Garden. Bishop Matthew Clarke of the Roman Catholic Diocese of Rochster read the names in the Book of Life, an illumninated manuscript recording the names of individuals in the Rochester area who died of AIDS. GRAIN begain recording names in the Book of Life in 1990. Keith Scherberger, an early volunteer for the AIDS Remembrance Garden steering committee, designed the layout for the Book of Life manuscript and recorded the initial names. Remembrance services would continue to be held at the AIDS Remembrance Garden each year for the duration of the period covered by the records in this collection.

Fundraising and landscaping continued throughout the 1990s. By 1992, Kevin J. (Meyers) Indovino had joined the project as publicist and volunteer coordinator. He later served as co-chair alongside Howe in 1995. He served as the sole chair/president of the AIDS Remembrance Garden from approximately 1997 through the duration of the period covered by the records in this collection.