The death of an angel of animal rights activism does not rate with that of a drugged-out rock star. So when Henry Spira died of cancer in September 1998, his death passed without notice, apart from a brief obituary in The New York Times. Yet Henry Spiral life tells us something important, not only about the modern animal movement, but about the possibility of an individual making a difference in the modern world.

I first met Henry when he turned up at an adult education seminar I was giving at New York University. I offered a course on "Animal Liberation" that attracted about 20 students. One student was an unusual specimen, outside the regular aesthetic of an "animal person". His clothes were untidy, and his hair uncombed. His language was so blunt and earthy that at times I thought I was listening to an assassin from a violent mob. Yet, I couldn't help feeling intrigued with his direct way of speaking and his solemn, secular oath to help animals in need.

I left New York soon after that, but one day got a call from Henry. He talked with me about his work. I knew that for over a century, the animal rights movement had been putting out graphic brochures, leaflets, and audio propaganda, alerting people to the dreadful experiments on animals. But in all that time, the number of animals used in experiments had risen from a small batch of a few hundred to more than 30 million. No activist had managed to stop a single experiment or improve the lives of animals living in tiny, constricted enclosures. Henry changed that. One of his earliest campaigns permanently closed down a laboratory conducting experiments with toxic vapor on about 60 rabbits.