Drew Cortez and Danny Cortez

Danny Cortez was the founder and pastor of the New Heart Community Southern Baptist Church in La Mirada, California, in 2014 when his 16-year-old son, Drew, told him that he was gay. Up until that time, Danny’s church would either recommend celibacy or reparative therapy—a widely discredited form of treatment that identifies homosexuality as a mental disorder with the goal of converting people to heterosexuality—to congregants who identified themselves as gay or lesbian.

Even before Drew’s coming out, Danny had slowly begun to reevaluate his views on homosexuality and whether he was doing more harm than good. When his neighbor invited him to visit the HIV clinic where he worked, Danny was introduced to a community of people he had not previously known much about. This began, for him, a gradual change of heart.

Years later, as he was driving Drew to school, “Same Love” by Macklemore & Ryan Lewis came on the radio. Danny liked it a lot but didn’t understand that it was a celebration of LGBT love. Drew, encouraged by his father’s affection for the song, then revealed to him that he was gay.

Realizing that they could no longer keep this secret from those they love, Drew posted a video online, and a week later, Danny delivered a sermon to his congregation about his changing views on homosexuality. As a result of the sermon, the Southern Baptist Convention cut ties with Danny’s church and his congregation split leading he and other members to form a separate LGBT inclusive, non-denominational church.

Danny and Drew came to StoryCorps to remember the sermon that changed their lives.

Originally aired on August 28, 2016, on NPR’s Weekend Edition

Rev. Troy Perry

On June 24, 1973, a fire tore through the Upstairs Lounge, a gay bar in New Orleans’ French Quarter. Thirty-two people were killed in the blaze and many more injured. To this day, it remains the deadliest fire in New Orleans history and until the killings on June 12 at Pulse nightclub in Orlando, Florida, this act of arson was believed to be the largest single mass killing of gay people in U.S. history.

Unlike in Orlando where there has been an outpouring of support for the victims, following the Upstairs Lounge fire, there was overwhelming silence from politicians, religious leaders, and the local community. And while police conducted an investigation, no one was ever arrested for the murders.

After hearing about the tragedy, Rev. Troy Perry (pictured at left with his partner Phillip “Buddy” De Blieck in June 1970, at the first LGBT Pride Parade in Los Angeles), founder of the Metropolitan Community Church, a national Christian denomination dedicated to serving gays and lesbians, flew from his home in California to New Orleans to provide support.

Offering comfort and assistance to the victims in hospitals, Rev. Perry recalls speaking with one badly burned man who told him that the school he taught at had fired him after learning that he was present at the Upstairs Lounge. That man died the next day.

Not wanting to return home until he held a service, Rev. Perry remembers the difficult time he had finding a church willing to act as a host. Eventually, the St. Mark’s United Methodist Church in the French Quarter opened its doors and mourners came to fill it. When the service ended, cameras outside confronted attendees and Rev. Perry offered them a way out the back. But in a show of strength, pride, and courage, “Nobody left by the backdoor. And that’s the legacy. We never ran away.”

The initial reaction to the fire is something that New Orleans has had to come to terms with in the ensuing years. In 1998, a plaque was placed on the spot where the Upstairs Lounge once stood to mark 25 years since the fire, and in a Time Magazine piece on the 40th anniversary of the blaze, the Roman Catholic Archdiocese of New Orleans apologized for its silence.

Rev. Perry came to StoryCorps to recall what he saw upon his arrival in New Orleans.

Originally aired June 24, 2016, on NPR’s Morning Edition.

Top Photo: Inside of the Upstairs Lounge on June 25, 1973. Associated Press/Jack Thornell.

Photo of Phillip “Buddy” De Blieck and Rev. Troy Perry courtesy of Rev. Troy Perry.

Francisco and Frankie Preciado

When Francisco Preciado was six years old, his family moved from Mexico to the California. They entered the United States through the Bracero program, which, starting in 1942 and lasting more than 20 years, allowed Mexican workers to come to the U.S. to take temporary agricultural jobs.

At the time, Francisco spoke only Spanish, but he quickly learned English with the help of his teachers. This led him to dream of one day becoming a teacher himself, but financial demands and the need to support his family forced him to drop out of school and begin working full-time.

In the early 1980s, he took a job as a groundskeeper at Stanford University and was often accompanied to the college by his young son Frankie. Francisco hoped that one day Frankie would become a student at Stanford, and his dream came true with Frankie graduating from the university in 2007 with degrees in political science and Chicano(a) Studies.

Now 31 years old, Frankie is the executive director of the union that represents Stanford’s service and technical workers, and whose membership also includes his father.

Francisco and Frankie came to StoryCorps to talk about their relationship and their time together at Stanford—one as a maintenance man, the other as a student.

Originally aired May 13, 2016, on NPR’s Morning Edition.

Above: Frankie with his father, Francisco, and his mother, Margarita, at his 2007 graduation from Stanford University.

Top: Frankie and Francisco at one of the fountains that Francisco takes care of on the campus of Stanford University.

Photos courtesy of the Preciado family.

Willie Harris and Alex Brown

For the past few years when Oscar nominees have been announced, there has been outrage both online and in the press. In 2016, all 20 individuals nominated in the acting categories were white. The outcry was so great that the governing board for the Academy of Motion Picture Arts and Sciences voted to add new members in order to increase diversity in the coming years.

For some African American people who have spent decades around the film industry, this continues to spotlight an age-old problem.

Willie Harris (pictured below) and Alex Brown (pictured above) came to Hollywood in the 1960s dreaming of breaking into the movies as stuntmen. Both were athletic and strong, but despite their qualifications, stunt coordinators repeatedly turned them away.

Realizing that movie studios had little interest in hiring black stuntmen—many wouldn’t even open stages and gyms for them to practice in—they continued to hone their skills training and practicing in public parks around Los Angeles. They would leap from bleachers onto donated mattresses and practice elaborate driving maneuvers using rented cars.

Eventually, Willie and Alex were able to break into the industry. They became original members of the Black Stuntmen’s Association, spending decades in Hollywood taking and throwing punches in films like The Color Purple and the James Bond classic Live and Let Die.

Willie and Alex came to StoryCorps to remember how they broke into the movies.

Originally aired February 26, 2016, on NPR’s Morning Edition.

Photos by Luisa Conlon for StoryCorps.

Teresa Valko

Teresa Valko’s family has been battling Alzheimer’s—a progressive disease that attacks the brain causing memory loss, the deterioration of thought and language skills, and changes in behavior—for generations.

According to Teresa, on her mother’s side of the family, there is a 100% occurrence of Alzheimer’s disease.

For many years, Teresa, who lives in California, would spend hours on the phone chatting with her mother, Evelyn Wilson (pictured above right), in Georgia (seen together below in Evelyn’s yard in 1980). But in 2007, Evelyn began to show the early symptoms of Alzheimer’s.

At StoryCorps, Teresa sat down with friends Lisa Farrell and Doris Barnhart to talk about her weekly telephone conversations with her mother and how they have changed over the years, as well as what she has learned about her own future health after undergoing genetic testing.

Originally aired November 13, 2015, on NPR’s Morning Edition.

NOTE: Two generations of Teresa’s family died of complications from Alzheimer’s including her aunt, uncle, grandmother, and all of her grandmother’s siblings. As of right now, none of her generation of family members have been diagnosed with the disease.

Photos courtesy of Teresa Valko.

Marilyn Hillerman and Andrea Crook

After graduating high school, Andrea Crook (right) moved from her parent’s home in Northern California to Los Angeles. She was on her own for the first time in her life and had never before knowingly experienced the symptoms of mental illness.

A few years later, when she was 24, Andrea began having paranoid thoughts, delusions, and her behavior became erratic. One day she picked up the phone and called her mother, Marilyn Hillerman (left), who knew by the tone of her voice that Andrea needed her help.

Almost 20 years later, the two of them sat down for StoryCorps in Sacramento, California, to discuss that call and its aftermath.

Andrea is now married with two children, and serves as a client advocate liaison for Mental Health America of Northern California.

Originally aired October 9, 2015, on NPR’s Morning Edition.

Chassitty Saldana and Noramay Cadena

Noramay Cadena is a mechanical engineer with several degrees from MIT.

Her family came to the U.S. from Mexico. They settled in Los Angeles where her parents worked in factories.

Noramay (pictured above right) came to StoryCorps with her teenage daughter, Chassitty Saldana (pictured above left), to remember one summer when, as a teenager, her parents brought her to work.

During her engineering career, Noramay has worked to improve conditions at factories like the ones where her parents still work.

Originally aired September 25, 2015, on NPR’s Morning Edition.

Photo courtesy of the Cadena family.

Roberto Olivera and Debra Olivera

Roberto Olivera grew up in the 1960s just outside of Los Angeles, California.

As a teenager, he worked multiple jobs to support his family, but would come home to a physically and verbally abusive stepfather.

At StoryCorps, Roberto tells his wife, Debra, about how his mother helped him escape.

Originally aired August 7, 2015, on NPR’s Morning Edition.

Santiago Arredondo and Aimee Arredondo

Santiago Arredondo, 32, grew up in Southern California, where he learned his strong work ethic from his family.

He recently recorded a StoryCorps interview with his wife, Aimee, to honor the most influential person in his life: his grandfather, Jose Guadalupe Enrique Sanchez, whose portrait he has tattooed on his arm.

Originally aired May 29, 2015, on NPR’s Morning Edition.

You can read more stories like this one in our book Callings: The Purpose and Passion of Work, a collection that celebrate the passion, determination, and courage it takes to pursue the work we feel called to do.

Callings is now available from Penguin Books. Get the book at our neighborhood bookstore, Greenlight Bookstore, or find it at your local bookstore.

Leslie Hurd

Leslie Hurd is a Navy CACO, or Casualty Assistance Calls Officer. When active duty members of the Navy die, CACOs break the news to their families – and support them during their time of grief.

Sometimes, these calls involve suicide. It’s estimated that roughly 22 veterans in the U.S. commit suicide each day.

At StoryCorps, Leslie remembers breaking the news to one of those families.

Originally aired May 23, 2015, on NPR’s Weekend Edition.