New collections have been digitized and are available for research on Calisphere as part of our NEH Grant-funded project The Bay Area’s Response to the AIDS Epidemic. 

UCSF’s holdings of the Shanti Project Records (MSS 98-48) document the organizations efforts to provide peer to peer supportive care for people suffering from terminal AIDS-related illnesses.

Shanti Project Executive Director Jim Geary.

Founded in 1974 by Dr. Charles Garfield, Shanti was a nearly defunct organization with no funding when Jim Geary took it over in 1982, working for no pay. He built it into a successful volunteer peer support organization supporting exclusively AIDS patients over the following six years. He resigned in 1988 amidst an array of mismanagement allegations.

Volunteer Counselor Training, 1983

The Mobilization Against AIDS Records (MSS 95-03) documents the advocacy and lobbying organization founded in 1984. They are perhaps best known for their Dance-a-thon and Candlelight Vigil fundraising and awareness raising activities.

Mobilization Against AIDS flyer, 1985.