Arnie Malmon, an AIDS activist and leader of the LGBT community, was a founder of the Cream City Foundation (CCF) and served on its Board of Directors for six years. In his service to CCF, he initiated the Major Donor Campaign which gave an opportunity for wealthier members of the community to contribute to the Foundation's works. He served as chair of CCF's Grants Committee and established the John Cowles Scholarship Fund.

A native and life-long resident of Milwaukee, Arnie worked in advertising and marketing, then in development and fundraising for non-profit groups. From 1975 to 1982, he directed the Milwaukee Blood Pressure Program, a public education effort affiliated with the Medical College of Wisconsin.

He was a member of ACT UP, concentrating his involvement on education. Arnie also volunteered for the Milwaukee AIDS Project (a.k.a. ARCW), where he was very active in program development, public education efforts and seeking grants on behalf of the agency. He also served on the internal review board of clinical drug trials.

In his "spare time", Arnie wrote a regular column for In Step Magazine entitled "Positively HIV", recounting his experiences living with the disease, and from which countless numbers of people received hope and inspiration. (View a selection of the "Positively HIV" articles.)

"Arnie emerged as the most effective AIDS educator in Milwaukee," said Doug Nelson, Executive Director of ARCW. "His writing and his speaking generated enlightenment abouts AIDS that has made this community far more compassionate in its response to this worstening epidemic."

Susan Guerrero of the ARCW recounts an occasion when several speakers addressed a Milwaukee junior high school assembly on HIV and AIDS issues; the previous speakers had not been able to hold the kids' attention, but when Arnie spoke, things changed. There was such an intensity to him, Susan's son told his mother: "You really wanted to sit there and listen to him".

Arnold M. Malmon died of complications due to AIDS on Wednesday, February 22, 1994 at Sinai Samaritan Medical Center in Milwaukee after a four year battle with the disease. He was 51. (In an eerie coincidence, his friend Christopher Fons, one of the founders of the local ACT UP chapter, preceeded Arnie in death by just one day.)

(Read the full text of Wisconsin Light's tribute to Arnie Malmon and Christopher Fons in the Vol. 8 No. 5 Issue of Wisconsin Light (5.9 MB PDF file).