Dawn's Gift - AIDS Education |
Pictures of Dawn Dawn at age 5. She was, even at this early age, often seen with a bright smile such as this one:
Unfortunately AIDS is not the only tragedy that Dawn endured. Here we see her at age 12, as a victim of '70s fashion (she soon made a miraculous recovery): By age 17 Dawn had pulled her life back together. Here she is in a high-school Drill Team photo: This is Dawn at age 20 taking a break from college studies to go out with her best friend and traveling companion, Karen Van Beek. Dawn would later ask Karen to put together her AIDS quilt panel: Here, at age 21, Dawn and her future sister-in-law appear after a refreshing pause at an airport. Dawn had recently started her favorite job as a Pan Am flight attendant, and was taking advantage of her flying privileges to visit her brother. (She was based in London at this time). A Christmas gathering when Dawn was a 22 year-old flight attendant. She's with her brother, father and mother: Here's Dawn on her 23rd birthday. She was dressed for her brother's wedding (she was still a flight attendant, and living in London; so he chose to get married on her birthday to help ensure that she would be there). She contracted HIV very shortly afterwards; though she wouldn't know that until she was 25: Dawn loved her job as a flight attendant - travel was her favorite pastime. She went all around the world; and now, with the help of some flight attendant friends, her ashes have been spread all over the world. Here she is at age 23 (and HIV+ now) in Yugoslavia: By age 24, Dawn was dating Jean-Pierre Beckhols, her future husband. She still did not know she had HIV, as she didn't find this out until a couple of weeks before her wedding. She had quit her flight-attendant job, and was now working for Boeing HR in Paris: Here's a portrait of Dawn and her brother when she was 27. By this time, she had full-blown AIDS. Some of the drugs were hard on her hair, so she now had to keep it much shorter. She and J.P. had moved to Seattle, and she was still working for Boeing: This is Dawn at 27 with her nephew. By this time, she had had to quit her Boeing job - but was just getting started as an AIDS Educator: And here Dawn, at 29, kind-of helps her niece open Christmas gifts: This is a shot that NWAF used in publicity photos. It was taken at age 30 by Dawn's good friend Anne-Marie Meredith, who Dawn put in charge of her memorial service. By this time, Dawn had started losing her vision; soon after, her hair would start getting drastically thinner due to the drugs she was taking to try to save her sight:
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