Herbert Spiers: November 8, 1945-March 2, 2011
Obituary of Herbert Spiers under construction, along with a list of representative photographs (dated, if possible), and an alphabetical bibliography of works about and by Spiers, and a Timeline of his life.
Obituary
To be written
Basic Info:
- Born: November 8, 1945, Columbus, Ohio
- Died: March 2, 2011, 11:35 pm, Mount Sinai Hospital, New York City
- Surviving Partner: Joe Daniel
- Surviving Relatives: Linda Godby (sister)
- Memorial service? Saturday, May 7, time and place to be announced.
- Donations to?
Bibliography, Alphabetical
Acting, dancing classes as youth: HS: "my mother had this notion that I should be an actor or a dancer, so instead of after school playing basketball and things like that with the boys, I had to go off to acting classes and dancing classes, and so I had the label of being a sissy." "I did a play, A Winter’s Tale, and [in forth grade] I played the prince, and it was a production of Ohio State University. . . ." (Schulman interview, page 3.)
ACT UP: (Schulman 21-) Asks what brought HS to. HS says he heard Larry Kramer speak at the Community Center,. Jim D'Eramo was there. HS attended a group that met a week later; maybe Tim Sweeney acted as facilitator. HS's group worked on names for organization. A young man who lived in NJ, Steve, suggested ACT UP. HS didn't like it. But everybody else did. HS says he was wrong. Because of his earlier work in gay liberation and Body Politic HS was ready to join in, he says.
- General meeting met Mondays at Community Center (27).
- Large numbers of women in ACT UP (28).
- SS suggests HS was involved in ACT UP starting in 1987. He says through the 1990s. He says he was on TV a number of times. Testified before government committees on AIDS. HS says in 1992-93 ACT UP ebbed and he was less involved. (SS 35-36)
- Liked Iris Long and others HS met in ACT UP.(SS 36)
- NIH action mentioned by SS, HS says he was not involved. Staley was. (SS 37)
- Universal health care as issue in ACT UP (Eigo on) versus narrower issues od drugs and treatments. HS agrees that narrower concept came to dominate.(SS 37).
- Relation between gay liberation organizing and women's organizing and ACT UP discussed (SS 38-39)
- Lack of knowledge of gay history discussed(SS 39).
- HS discusses founding of ACT UP, and role of Kramer and the talk he gave. HS: there was "no founder or a founder, . . . it was truly, from my experience, a group of people sharing a set of common beliefs, common frustrations, common anger, that came together. . . ."(SS 39-40)
- Impact of ACT UP discussed (SS 40-41-42) HS sums up: "there’s still a great need for that activism. Mentions Mark [Milano] "one of them who is still around, who’s still fighting the good fight", who is saying “Hey, everybody out here, listen, it ain’t over. Yes, people are surviving more and longer, but it ain’t over.”
ACT UP Issues Committee: Nobody knew much about the FDA, CDC, or the medical issues, or how you form a political organization around the crisis. (25-26).
- Issues Committee was formed and HS became the chair, after the first chair. They met at HS's house. 30 people maybe. Meetings lasted 3-4 hours sometimes (SS 36).
- Issues Committee was influential. Helped gestate AIDS Treatment Committee [Treatment & Data], from which Mark Harrington, Peter Staleey, Jim Eigo, and others emerged. Became experts on the disease.
- HS met at his home privately with Burton Lee (name correct?), Bush's AIDS czar. He was Surgeon General, and he tried to understand gay response. (26).
- Issues Committee drafted document for AIDS meeting, Montreal, that ACT UP took over. "I wrote those demands." Eric Sawyer delivered demands [incorrect, Sawyer was not in Montreal: Sawyer to Katz, email March 2011]; Conyers Thomson delivered the demands in English and French, though HS thought he should. Tim McCaskell of the the AIDS Committee of Toronto joined them. (26-27) This is HS's fondest action (SS 36)
- Act Up not a top down organization (SS 31)
- Issues Committee faded away. The cocktail came in, Clinton administration, and more positive social and political response. (SS 35).
ACT UP Treatment and Data Committee: HS not too involved (SS 34)
AIDS: HS on first awareness of. New York Times "front page story". Soon afterward Larry Kramer and others were at Fire Island [Pines] handing out fliers about "gay cancer" and that something needed to be done. HS doubted there could be such a thing as "gay cancer.
- Then a friend died (Larry). H visited him in hospital. He died c. 1980-81.
- Idea that AIDS was sexually transmitted was mistrusted due to his sexual llberation background. Larry Downes, his doctor mentioned it. (Schulman 20-21-22).
- What were the issues discussed asks SS and HS explains. (27-28) Slow development of new drugs discussed (28-29). Bill Bahlman's research mentioned. (SS 30) HS gave reports on Issues Committees findings to general meeting, but did not do research.(SS 30-31) Inaction of Federal Drug Administration (FDA) discussed. (SS 31)
- See also GMHC, Kramer, Downes, Larry _______, Louise Hay, sexual liberation, Callen, Sonnabend, Montreal AIDS meeting that ACT UP took over
bars, clubs, NYC: Flamingo, Christopher Street and West Village area bars, piers. (Schulman 20)
Body Politic, The. HS: Toronto Gay Action led to forming of. Schulman interview, p. 6) "I was at the first, the collecting [sic -- collective] meeting that organized it, and I’ve been involved in it for many, many years afterwards until I moved here down to New York. Women and men? HS on. Chris Bearchell and Pat Murphy mentioned, and Pat's girlfriend. (Schulman interview p. 14) PB and intergenerational sex issue; done in by financial pressures. (Schulman, p. 15)
Callen, Michael. Developed the Community Research Initiative (CRI) and HS sat on board of that organization. (SS 29)
Canadian Lesbian and Gay Archives.
- Canadian Vertical File: Spiers, Herb:
- ACT-UP Oral History Project. Transcript of interview with Herb Spiers by Sarah Schulman, July 2, 2008. 42 p.
- Spiers, Herbert R. “ Community consultation and AIDS clinical trials, Part 1.” IRB: Ethics and Human Research, May-June 1991, p.7-10.
- Photographs, (1971-1978): Several photographs (12 entries) in the collection of CLGA.
Catholic Church. HS: mentioned by HS as attending. (Schulman interview, page 2.)
Catholic seminary preparatory school. HS: "I went to an all-boys’ school, too, which was a Catholic seminary preparatory. . . ." (Schulman interview, page 3.)
CBC Digital Archives: "Drag queens on Halloween". Broadcast Date: Oct. 30, 1973
- Spiers interviewed. CBC description: "Exuberant cross-dressers, gay-baiting hecklers and glamorous female impersonators: they're all part of the scene at Toronto's Club Manatee on Halloween night in the early 1970s. The unlicensed gay dance club hosts a popular drag show every Halloween, attracting both friendly and hostile crowds. In this CBC-TV film from 1973, vignettes from the street outside are interspersed with scenes of three men and a woman dressing up for the evening – the men in women's clothes and makeup, the woman with a man's hat and pencil moustache. Warning: This item contains offensive language."
Columbus, Ohio: Birth place and youth of HS.
Community Homophile Association of Toronto. HS: "it was meeting at a place called Trinity Church" (1969 or 1970).
death: HS saw open caskets in his early family life. (Schulman 24)
Fire Island (Pines):
Friends (Ohio) mentioned by HS: Patty Ryan (Schulman interview, p. 3?) Tom Rossetti and his wife Carol. (Schulman interview, p. 4.)
Gay Liberation Front (London). HS: (early 1970s) "we’d have people from GLF of London come over, and they’d stay at various houses and stay with people and talk with people and urge us on." (Schulman interview, p. 11)
gay liberation ideology vs. present ideology: HS and SS on. (Schulman, p. 16)
GMHC (Gay Men's Health Crisis): HS did a calendar for, with Jim D'Eramo. Safer sex mentioned. Sexual transmission of AIDS mentioned. Mitchell Cutler, started Buddies Program at GMHC, and HS was involved with that. Had several buddies. GMHC strove not to be political. GMHC got rid of executive director who tried to make it more political and came to ACT UP meetings. He came from Canada. SS asked if that was "Tim". (Schulman 22-23-24)
Graduate school. Ohio State, first. University of Toronto, second. Studied philosophy. HS mentions. (Schulman interview, page 4, 5)
Hay, Louise: HS mentions as speaking at a church, and Gay and Lesbian Center. Discussed death. (Schulman 24)
High school, Columbus, Ohio. Mentioned. (Schulman interview, page 2._
Intimate relationships. HS mentions Grant in Toronto, and break up. (Schulman, page ?)
Hannon, Gerald. HS on article on intergenerational sex in PB. "Men Loving Boys Loving Men". (Schulman, p. 15) Supreme Court of Canada found BP innocent of breaking law. Second BP article on intergenerational sex and police raid on PB office. (Schulman, p. 16)
Landy, David. HS mentions L's website Survivorship A-Z.(SS 41)
Larry (friend of HS who early got and died of AIDS): (Schulman 24 and earlier)
leather good store, NYC: Herb worked in one summer and was fascinated. (Schulman 20)
MacDonald, Paul. HS mentions influence on Toronto gay lib of "Paul Macdonald, who lived in London for a while, and the Gay Liberation Front in London was very, very active and took direct action." (Schulman interview, p. 11)
newspaper in Toronto, leftist, underground. HS: had the name "Guerilla" in its title. HS: "they had one column or editorial that I thought was very backward in terms of its understanding gay liberation. I wrote them a letter, and I got back to me that this had created a great stir . . . . (Schulman interview, p 13)
New York City. HS moved to from Toronto. (Schulman interview, p. 18-20.) Jim Steakly preceded her in move from Toronto. HS's great aunt inspired his interest in NYC and invited him as a youth to visit her. Bars and clubs mentioned by name.
Pink Triangle Press: HS on (Schulman, p. 15). Bought out Body Politic and Extra.
Psychiatrist in Ohio. Positive experience described by HS. (Schulman interview, p. 4)
Relatives. HS: "one relative who was in Jamestown and fought in the Revolutionary War, and they eventually migrated from there to Pittsburgh and then into the Central Ohio area, and this would have been back in the 1800s, early 1800s." [Schulman interview, page 1.)
sexual liberation: discussed as part of gay liberation, then as an aspect of AIDS crisis. (Schulman, see sections on GMHC, ACT UP, AIDS)
S.I. Fine Arts. Spier's title? Founder? principle?
- From the website: "S.I. International was founded three decades ago [c. 1981] in the United States, with the Spanish sister company S.I. Barcelona founded five decades ago. Based in Manhattan and Barcelona, the firm’s S.I. Fine Arts division annually sells millions of dollars in original oil paintings, sculptures, pastels and limited editions.
- We represent an innovative and international variety of artists and sell primarily to galleries. S.I. focuses on representational work."
Spiers, Herb. "The Art of Gabriel Picart." 2009?
Sonnabend, Joe. HS mentions as unsung hero of AIDS crisis. Associated with Callen and Community Research Initiative. (SS 29-30)
Spiers, Herb. Interviewed by Sarah Schulman, July 2, 2008. Act Up Oral History Project. Interview Number: 090 Source of data on ACT UP, AIDS, GMHC.
Spiers, Herb. "The life below the life : sexuality in the conception and perception of self and other : a philosophical analysis by Herbert Roth Spiers. PhD thesis 1978. (University of Toronto)
Spiers, Herb. Photograph. Cover, The Body Politic (Toronto), <pub data, page?>
Spiers, Herb. Photograph naked. The Body Politic (Toronto) <pub data, inside page? >
Toronto. HS discuses first going to and meeting young man, Grant, and falling in love, in 1969 or 1970.. (Schulman interview page 4, 5.)
Toronto Gay Action. HS calls it "a very radical group" and "I became the convener". That "led to the founding of the first gay liberation newspaper in Canada, one of the earliest in North America, called The Body Politic. (Schulman interview p 6.) HS describes its politics as left, socialist, or communist, Marxist. (Schulman interview, p. 13).
Toronto, commune in Kensington Market. HS: one of the gay liberationists moved in with me, and then we moved into a little commune in a place in Toronto called Kensington Market, and we were all gay liberationists there, and there was one woman with a little baby . . . " (Schulman interview, p. 9)
"We Demand" petition and demo in Ottawa. HS authored with David Newcom. Schulman, p. 18 and see 1971, August 28, below)
Herb Spiers, left, Brian Mossop, long-time Canadian gay activist, right.
Timeline
1945, November 8
Born, Columbus, Ohio
1971. August 28
On August 28, 1971, homosexual men and women rallied on Parliament Hill in Ottawa, in the first large-scale gay demonstration in Canada. Canadian Lesbian and Gay Archives. "We Demand. The August 28th Gay Day Committee. Report in The Body Politic, Issue 1, Nov / Dec 1971. Reprinted in Flaunting It!, 1982. Spiers cited as co-writer with David Newcome of We Demand text.
1971, November
Spiers, Herb. [Review] MAURICE A GAY NOVEL. Body Politic, Nov/Dec 71, Issue 1, p12, 2/3p
- Subjects: BOOKS; HOMOSEXUALITY; REVIEWS; FICTION; MAURICE (Book); FORSTER, E. M. (Edward Morgan), 1879-1970
1972
Loubser, Jan J. Herbert Spiers, Carolyn Moody. The York County Board of Education: A Study in Innovation. Ontario Institute for Studies in Education, 1972. ISBN 0774400722 / 9780774400725 / 0-7744-0072-2.
- Is this our Herb Spiers?
1972, January
Spiers, Herb. CBC: PUT-OFF or NOTHING TO HIDE?: nothing to Show. Body Politic, Jan/Feb72, Issue 2, p1, 3p
- Subjects: HOMOSEXUALITY on television; TELEVISION programs; TORONTO (Ont.); ONTARIO; CANADA; CANADIAN Broadcasting Corp.; NOTHING to Hide (TV program); KERR, John
Spiers, Herb. CHAT GETS A CONSTITUTION. Body Politic, Jan/Feb72, Issue 2, p14, 2p
- Subjects: HOMOSEXUALITY -- Societies, etc.; ASSOCIATIONS, institutions, etc.; TORONTO (Ont.); ONTARIO; CANADA; CONSTITUTIONS
1972, May
Spiers, Herb. CREATIVE PSYCHE [and] HOMOSEXUALITY. Herb. Body Politic, May/Jun72, Issue 4, p6, 3p
- Subjects: BOOKS; GAYS; REVIEWS; NONFICTION; HOMOSEXUALITY (Book); ROSENFELS, Paul
- online at: Ninth Street Center: Spiers
1972, July
Spiers, Herb. [Review] Contemporary Sexual Behavior: Critical Issues in the 1970's/The Modernization of Sex/Perversion: The Erotic Form of Hatred... (Books). Body Politic, Jul/Aug72 Supplement, Issue 5, p3, 3p
- Subjects: BOOKS; REVIEWS; CONTEMPORARY Sexual Behavior: Critical Issues in the 1970s (Book); MODERNIZATION of Sex, The (Book); PERVERSION (Book); NEW Sexuality, The (Book)
1973, October 30
CBC Digital Archives: "Drag queens on Halloween". Broadcast Date: Oct. 30, 1973
- Spiers interviewed. CBC description: "Exuberant cross-dressers, gay-baiting hecklers and glamorous female impersonators: they're all part of the scene at Toronto's Club Manatee on Halloween night in the early 1970s. The unlicensed gay dance club hosts a popular drag show every Halloween, attracting both friendly and hostile crowds. In this CBC-TV film from 1973, vignettes from the street outside are interspersed with scenes of three men and a woman dressing up for the evening – the men in women's clothes and makeup, the woman with a man's hat and pencil moustache. Warning: This item contains offensive language."
1973, [month?]
Spiers, Herb. simple & brief. Body Politic, 1973, Issue 9, p11, 1/6p
- Subjects: GAYS; OPPRESSION (Psychology); MENTAL health; Offices of Mental Health Practitioners (except Physicians); Advertising Material Distribution Services; PAMPHLETS; PSYCHIATRY
1973, [month?]
Spiers, Herb. academics on sex. Body Politic, 1973, Issue 9, p9, 2p
- Subjects: BOOKS; REVIEWS; GOALS of Human Sexuality, The (Book); MAN & Woman, Boy & Girl (Book); SINGER, Irving; MONEY, John; EHRHARDT, Anke A.
Winter 1973
Spiers, Herb. [Review} The Life to Come and Other Stories. Body Politic, Winter73, Issue 7, p10, 2/3p Subjects: BOOKS; GAYS; REVIEWS; FICTION; LIFE to Come & Other Stories, The (Book); FORSTER, E. M. (Edward Morgan), 1879-1970
1974, May
Spiers, Herb, and Headon, Chris; Hannon, Gerald; Walker, Merv; Walker, Nancy. [Reviews] BLACK Diaries (Book); GAY Church, The (Book); CITY Within, The (Book); WHAT Happened. Body Politic, May/Jun74, Issue 13, p8, 4p
- Subjects: BOOKS; REVIEWS; BLACK Diaries (Book); GAY Church, The (Book); CITY Within, The (Book); WHAT Happened (Book)
1974, September
Spiers, Herb. [Review] Different: An Anthology of Homosexual Short Stories. Body Politic, Sep/Oct74, Issue 15, p21, 2p
- Subjects: BOOKS; HOMOSEXUALITY; REVIEWS; FICTION; DIFFERENT (Book)
1974, October
1974, November
Spiers, Herb. [Review] Outrage. [TV program.] Body Politic, Nov/Dec74, Issue 16, p19, 1/2p
- Subjects: TELEVISION programs; GAYS; Radio and Television Broadcasting and Wireless Communications Equipment Manufacturing; Television Broadcasting; TELEVISION broadcasting; OUTRAGE (TV program)
Spiers, Herb. [Review] Religion & Sexism; Images of Women in the Jewish and Christian Traditions. Body Politic, Nov/Dec 74, Issue 16, p22, 9/10p
- Subjects: BOOKS; SEXISM; REVIEWS; NONFICTION; RELIGION & Sexism (Book)
1974, [month?]
Spiers, Herb. Commentary: Scottish law reform. Herb. Body Politic, 1974, Issue 11, p6, 1/4p
- Subjects: HOMOSEXUALITY -- Law & legislation; SEX & law; SCOTLAND; BILLS, Legislative; LAW reform
1975, December
Spiers, Herb. Press: The Homosexual: Newly Visible, Newly Understood/Gays on the March. Body Politic, Dec75, Issue 21, p19, 4/5p
- Subjects: HOMOSEXUALITY; PERIODICALS; GAYS; CANADA; CIRCULATION
Spiers, Herb. [Review] Women in China (Book). Body Politic, Dec 75, Issue 21, p23, 1/3p
- Subjects: BOOKS; WOMEN; REVIEWS; NONFICTION; WOMEN in China (Book); CURTIN, Katie
1976, February
Spiers, Herb. [Review] Male Homosexuals: Their Problems and Adaptations/Male and Female Homosexuality: A Comprehensive Investigation (Book). Body Politic, Feb76, Issue 22, p7, 2/5p
- Subjects: BOOKS; REVIEWS; MALE Homosexuals (Book); MALE & Female Homosexuality (Book); WEINBERG, Martin S.; WILLIAMS, Colin J.; SAGIR, Marcel T.; ROBINS, Eli
Spiers, Herb. [Review] Saturday Night at the Baths [movie]. Body Politic, Feb76, Issue 22, p8, 1/3p
- Subjects: MOTION pictures; HOMOSEXUALITY; REVIEWS; HOMOSEXUALITY in motion pictures; SATURDAY Night at the Baths (Film); BUCKLEY, David
1976, October
Spiers, Herb. [Review] Contemporary Sexual Behavior: Critical Issues in the 1970's/The Modernization of Sex/ Perversion: The Erotic Form of Hatred (Book). Body Politic, Oct 76, Issue 27, p3, 3p
- Subjects: HOMOSEXUALITY; CONTEMPORARY Sexual Behavior: Critical Issues in the 1970s (Book); MODERNIZATION of Sex, The (Book); NEW Sexuality, The (Book); ROBINSON, Paul; RUITENBEEK, Hendrik
1977, May
Spiers, Herb, and Lynch, Michael. The Gay Rights Freud. Body Politic, May 77, Issue 33, p8, 4p
- Subjects: HOMOSEXUALITY; HETEROSEXUALITY; LETTERS; PSYCHOLOGISTS; NEW Introductory Lectures on Psychoanalysis (Book); FREUD, Sigmund, 1856-1939
1977, June
Spiers, Herb. The Sexual Outlaw: A Documentary (Book). Body Politic, Jun77, Issue 34, p18, 1/5p, 3 Black and White Photographs
- Subjects: BOOKS; GAYS; REVIEWS; NONFICTION; SEXUAL Outlaw, The (Book); RECHY, John
1980, May
Spiers, Herb. [Review] States of Desire: Travels in Gay America. (Book). Body Politic, May 80, Issue 63, p33, 1/4p, 1 Black and White Photograph
- Subjects: BOOKS; TRAVEL; REVIEWS; NONFICTION; STATES of Desire (Book); WHITE, Edmund
2002, November
- Spiers interviewed and quoted:
- "Though the appreciation of nudes is at an all-time high, the American marketplace does seem to have its limits and prefers what Herb Spiers of Selected International Fine Arts (SIFA) in New York calls "the demure nude." "From my experience, it is easier to sell demure nudes, which usually means they are seen from the back or partially covered," he explained." Etc.
2008, July 2
2009
Spiers, Herb. "The Art of Gabriel Picart." 2009?
2009, April 24-26
Joe Daniel '92 MBA & Herbert Spiers are Gold Hosts of "The First Ever Yale LGBT Reunion.
<comments />
