Herb Spiers was born on November 8, 1945, in Columbus, Ohio. A graduate of the Ohio State University and the University of Toronto, Spiers was among the founders of Toronto Gay Action and The Body Politic in Toronto. After moving to New York in the late 1970s, he worked with Gay Men’s Health Crisis and and helped found ACT UP (the AIDS Coalition to Unleash Power) in the 1980s. He died on March 2, 2011. You can learn more about his life and legacy in Herbert Spiers, 1945-2011, by Jonathan Ned Katz.