Chilli Pepper, a staunch advocate for LGBTQ+ rights and one of the first celebrities to raise awareness of the AIDS crisis, has died

Chilli Pepper, a celebrated performance artist who was one of Chicago’s most famous drag performers for more than 40 years and a staunch advocate for LGBTQ+ rights and causes, has died.

Chilli Pepper was crowned Miss Gay Chicago in 1974, and was the first Miss Continental in 1980. In a 2017 interview, she said she preferred the term “female impersonator” to “drag queen”—but as noted by the Chicago LGBT Hall of Fame, she gained a great deal of media exposure when few were speaking of drag or drag queens.

Chilli was also one of the first celebrities to raise awareness of the AIDS crisis in the 1980s, the Hall of Fame noted. She addressed the subject during the ‘80s and ‘90s on numerous nationally syndicated talk shows, including Oprah Winfrey.

“You were seeing people who were dying, and a lot of people weren’t doing anything because people didn’t understand what was happening. People were dying all around you. They were dying very quickly,” Chilli said in 2013.

“So I was blessed by having lots of media exposure, and because of that—the media has such a big, big power; people don’t believe it that the media can do, make or break anyone—and when you go on a show like ‘Donahue,’ which is a very legitimate show, and then Oprah, and then Joan Rivers and people like that, who don’t understand our way of living, and maybe they never will—but they allowed me to speak for people who could not speak.”

Oprah Winfrey became a close personal friend of Chilli’s. In March, Chilli presented Winfrey with a GLAAD Media Vanguard Award, which the Gay & Lesbian Alliance Against Defamation presents each year to an ally who does not identify as LGBTQ+, but who has shown dedication to promoting LGBTQ+ people and issues.

The Chicago LGBT Hall of Fame wrote, “Chilli Pepper has used her dynamic and formidable presence to advance awareness and understanding of the notion that diversity is both healthy and American.” The hall of fame also called her “a Chicago institution, much like the Water Tower, only with better jewellery.”