Ganga Stone (October 30, 1941 – June 2, 2021) was a Cabrini Hospice volunteer who went on to found God's Love We Deliver with Jane Best when she realized the number of homebound AIDS patients that were unable to get meal delivery.[1][2] She remained with the organization into 1994 and was sometimes called St. Ganga by the clients she served.[3]

Stone was born Ingrid Hedley Stone and was raised in Long Island City, Queens and the Van Cortlandt area of The Bronx. She was the daughter of Hedley Stone (ne Moishe Chaim Stein), a Jewish immigrant from Warsaw, Poland, and Winifred, the daughter of Norwegian Lutheran immigrants. She was given the name Ganga, after the Ganges River, when she studied at an ashram in Ganeshpuri, India with Swami Muktananda and cited yoga as a long-term influence on her life.[4][5][6]

Along with Peter Avitabile of Gay Men's Health Crisis, Stone is cited as one of the first individuals to realize the need for service organizations to address the AIDS epidemic.[7] Stone's book, Start the Conversation was published by Grand Central in 1996.[8]

Stone had a son named Clement Hill and a daughter named Hedley Stone. She died on June 2, 2021, in Saratoga Springs, New York, at age 79.[1]

References

  1. 1 2 Roberts, Sam (2021-06-04). "Ganga Stone, Who Gave Sustenance to AIDS Patients, Dies at 79". The New York Times. Retrieved 16 June 2021.
  2. ↑ Ross, Harold Wallace; White, Katharine Sergeant Angell (February 1991). The New Yorker. F-R Publishing Corporation. p. 28.
  3. ↑ India Today. Living Media India Pvt. Limited. 1994. p. 64. Retrieved 16 June 2021.
  4. ↑ Zaleski, Jeff (December 1994). "God's Love We Deliver". Yoga Journal. Active Interest Media, Inc. Retrieved 16 June 2021.
  5. ↑ Povitz, Lana Dee (2019-08-27). Stirrings: How Activist New Yorkers Ignited a Movement for Food Justice. UNC Press Books. pp. 131–169. ISBN 978-1-4696-5302-0. Retrieved 16 June 2021.
  6. ↑ Straube, Trenton (2021-06-11). "R.I.P. Ganga Stone, Who Fed People Living With AIDS and Cofounded GLWD". POZ. Retrieved 16 June 2021.
  7. ↑ Chambré, Susan Maizel (2006). Fighting for Our Lives: New York's AIDS Community and the Politics of Disease. Rutgers University Press. pp. 61–62. ISBN 978-0-8135-3867-9. Retrieved 16 June 2021.
  8. ↑ Stone, Ganga (1996). Start the conversation. Grand Central Publishing. ISBN 9780446672801.
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