Partner Basilio Rivera
Queer Places:
249 W 22nd St, New York, NY 10011
Eastview Cemetery
Newton, Catawba County, North Carolina, USA
Mountain View Memorial Park
Barstow, San Bernardino County, California, USA
Carl Pence Sigmon (October 28, 1926 – January 26, 1993) was an AIDS activist.
Carl Pence Sigmon was born in Granite Falls, N.C., Sigmon lived in New York City for many years before moving to Plainfield in 1986. Sigmon, a trained classical pianist, retired from the music business in 1984. His companion of 24 years, Basilio T. Rivera (March 4, 1923 - April 24, 1986), died of AIDS in 1986, three months after the pair moved to Plainfield. Despite having had two massive heart attacks and knowing he might die of heart failure, Sigmon took up the fight against some of the sources of AIDS, such as sharing dirty hypodermic needles. He was active in the Union County Consortium on AIDS, the Ryan White Committee in Newark, the Governor's Commission on AIDS, the New Jersey caucus of AIDS Coalition to Unleash Power and the New Jersey Coalition of AIDS Services Providers. "He was pretty amazing," said Richard Deagle. Sigmon was quoted as saying in 1990, "I can't apologize to people who are dead, and I think we all owe them an apology when they die unnecessarily. "I owe them an apology unless I'm working to save their lives," he said. During his fight against the deadly disease, he wrote letters to Gov. Jim Florio and each member of the Legislature, asking them to repeal a 1989 law that mandated reporting HIV patients. Deagle recalled that Sigmon was a part of a group called WAVE-3 that challenged needle laws by exchanging dirty ones for clean ones in New York and Jersey City. When police moved in to arrest demonstrators including Sigmon, Deagle said, "We were afraid his heart would stop." His frail health did not deprive Sigmon of a role in getting the needle law knocked down in Jersey City, Deagle said.
Sigmon died on January 26, 1993, at his home in Plainfield. "Silence equals death" was Sigmon's credo, and even though he has died, his activism will continue to speak loudly, colleagues in the New York AIDS Coalition to Unleash Power said.
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