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Come hear first-hand about what it was like to work alongside HARVEY MILK. He is portrayed by actor Emile Hirsch in director Gus Van Sant's biopic MILK.

Cleve’s career as an activist began in San Francisco during the turbulent 1970s when pioneer gay rights leader Harvey Milk befriended him. He worked as a student intern in Milk’s office while studying political science at San Francisco State University.

In 1983, when AIDS was still a new and poorly understood threat, Jones co-founded the San Francisco AIDS Foundation. Jones conceived the idea of the AIDS Memorial Quilt at a candlelight memorial for Harvey Milk in 1985 and in 1987 created the first quilt panel in honor of his friend Marvin Feldman. The AIDS Memorial Quilt has grown to become the world’s largest community arts project.

In 1999, Cleve was a keynote speaker at the Parliament of World Religions in Cape Town, South Africa. Cleve organized an 8-city tour of the South African Memorial Quilt with the support of the Black Congressional Caucus and Coretta Scott King. Jones was a key organizer for the Nation Equality March in Washington D.C. in October 2009 to demand equal rights under the law for the LGBT community. Jones states, “It is for equality. And it’s for shifting the strategy, we’re tired of this state-by-state, county-by-county, city-by-city struggle for fractions of equality.” Cleve's work has been featured on Nightline, Good Morning American and Oprah.

" Cleve Jones dislikes being called a visionary. But what appellation wouldsuit a man who worked with assassinated San Francisco Supervisor Harvey Milk, led San Francisco’s gay community in the famed White Night riots after Milk’s martyrdom and then brought the epidemic to mainstream America by creating the AIDS Memorial Quilt? .

" Like the group of young people meeting in Chicago, he feels the need to step forward and demand equality on his own timeline instead of a pre-determined time table established by Gay Inc. He doesn't feel the community has reached out to those like him and isn't willing to wait for the crumbs the establishment drops occasionally -- like cocktail parties at the White House -- while stalling on issues of importance like employment and housing protections, Don't Ask Don't Tell, or relationship recognition.