When Andrew Ruffner was young, he was worried about being accepted as a gay man. But now he’s helping build a community in Hollywood.
Ruffner, 59, has worked on numerous projects that aim to create spaces for education and preservation in Hollywood.
In the past seven years, Ruffner has led HIV prevention programs in schools, curated exhibits on HIV history, and taught students about the city’s history through art and humanities. “I’m putting a lot of work into Hollywood,” said Ruffner.
And his boss agrees.
“I think what he’s going to do and what he’s looking at for the organization is seeing how we can grow our presence in the community,” said Clive Taylor, president of the Hollywood Historical Society, where Ruffner serves as executive director. “And it takes somebody like Andy, with his experience, to make that happen.”
Growing up in 1970s Cincinnati was challenging for Ruffner, who felt forced to hide his sexuality.
“People weren’t open about being gay at all,” said Ruffner. “Cincinnati was one of the most conservative parts of the state. So, I purposely went to college 500 miles away.”
At The University of Rochester in upstate New York, he found a more progressive environment that allowed him to explore his identity and embrace who he was.
Ruffner became involved in grassroot LGBTQ+ organizations, including GLSEN and GLUE.
He even joined a gay men’s chorus despite having no singing abilities.
“You had these really talented gay guys that would hold their ears when I sang next to them, but that was a real sense of community,” Ruffner said. “I seek community. As a gay man growing up, I was not sure whether or not it would be accepted.”
After college, Ruffner began his career as a mental health counselor, working with teenagers who had alcohol and drug addictions.
But the 1980s brought devastation to the gay community as the AIDS crisis unfolded, hitting home for Ruffner.
According to the National Institutes of Health, more than 700,000 people in the United States have died from AIDS since its identification in 1981.
Ruffner lost two partners to HIV.
“That was a very sad thing. We had built a home together,” said Ruffner about one of his late partners, “So right around the time that he passed away, I started working in emergency medicine.”
Ruffner’s HIV work started when he began to manage a public health research project testing people for HIV based in an emergency department of a hospital.
“I was following what was going on,” said Ruffner. “I got really deep into public health, all that kind of work. And I worked there for 12 years.”
This marked the beginning of a long journey of serving others in his community.
When Ruffner moved to Hollywood in 2018 with his husband, David, he met Réquel Lopes, the new executive director of the World AIDS Museum, and was offered the position of director of education for the museum.
“Message Received?” is a project Ruffner created where high school students would create an exhibit showcasing art from various countries depicting the AIDS crisis and LGBTQ+ experiences in their country.
“It made me feel proud of myself. I never thought I would be able to call myself a museum curator,” said Nicole Ortiz, who was a senior in high school when she participated in the project. “It was a space where everybody came together to learn and share their own experiences.”
When Ruffner left the World AIDS Museum in 2022, he kept the museum’s slogan of “documenting, remembering, and empowering” in his heart.
He carried the saying with him to the Hollywood Historical Society.
The society has a collection of over 20,000 items related to the history of Hollywood, which they use to create rotating exhibits in the building.
“Our Liberia” was a recent project of Ruffner’s, in which middle school and high school students explored the history of Liberia and Hollywood by learning how to create museum exhibits.
Founded in 1923, Liberia was a historically Black community that was separated from Hollywood due to segregation. During a time of widespread racial division, it became one of the few places where Black people could express themselves.
“The kids got to interview the people that had been the alumni of the high school that was in Liberia that graduated back in the ‘60s,” said Ruffner. “They did oral histories and interviews, and then they created museum exhibits.”
For Ruffner, teaching kids about the humanities and arts is vital.
“I think we do kids such a disservice. There’s a whole wide world out there,” said Ruffner. “And you should do the things that bring you joy and that you’re good at.”
Ruffner believes if you have a passion, you should pursue it, and it frustrates him that kids aren’t aware of the possibilities available to them.
“That’s why it was really important for me and for these kids in the Liberia project to see people who were making a living in the humanities and arts because everybody ignores that,” said Ruffner. “You can have a lot of fulfillment and a lot of success.”
“Andy has opened the door to this historic organization to the young people, which is dear to my heart because I feel like that’s how I got started, and that’s how you get young people interested in historic preservation and historic awareness,” said Taylor.
