‘A Package Deal’: Two Brothers Face Mortality Together
David Carles and his little brother, Mark Carles, were best friends.
David and Mark Carles at a family wedding in 2002. Courtesy of Mark Carles.
Growing up on Staten Island, the two did everything together. But in 2018, at the age of 24, Mark’s life was upended by a rare form of liver cancer called fibrolamellar hepatocellular carcinoma.
David Carles’ Tinder profile. Courtesy of David Carles.
A year after that diagnosis, the brothers sat down at StoryCorps in New York City to talk about the ways Mark’s illness had changed their lives.
Mark died on February 24th, 2022. He was 27. David came back to StoryCorps to remember him, just a few days after his death.
Top photo: Mark Carles and David Carles at their StoryCorps interview in New York City on November 6th, 2019. By Mia Warren for StoryCorps.
Listen to David and Mark’s original 2019 conversation:
Originally aired November 22nd, 2019, on NPR’s Morning Edition. An edited version was rebroadcast on March 4, 2022 on the same program.
From Civil War To Civil Rights: Remembering A “Fearless” Midwife And Matriarch
Mary Stepp Burnette Hayden was born into enslavement in Black Mountain, North Carolina. She was 7 years old when she was freed.
Mary Stepp Burnette Hayden, about 1942, with her granddaughter, Mary Othella Burnette, and two of Hayden’s great-grandchildren. Courtesy of Mary O. Burnette.
Mary would go on to become a midwife in the Appalachian town, a practice she learned from her mother, who was sold to a plantation in Black Mountain at the age of 13 to treat sick or injured enslaved people.
Mary died at the age of 98, at the dawn of the civil rights era.
In her lifetime, she delivered several hundred babies… including her own grandchildren.
One of them, Mary Othella Burnette, came to StoryCorps with her daughter, Debora Hamilton Palmer, to honor the family matriarch.
Mary Othella Burnette and Debora Hamilton Palmer in 2015, Michigan. Courtesy of Mary O. Burnette.
Top Photo: Mary Othella Burnette and Debora Hamilton Palmer at their StoryCorps interview in Saint Clair Shores, MI, and Sparks, NV, on Feb. 6, 2022. By StoryCorps.
Originally aired February 18, 2022 on NPR’s Morning Edition.
From Dire Straits To Friends For Life: How Living On The Road Brought Them Together
In August of 2014, Kat Valentino was living in a run-down motel with her family. They eventually decided to move into a van — a blue, 1991 Ford Econoline.
She’d soon find a community of others living out of their vehicles, mostly those impacted by the Great Recession who had foregone traditional housing, seeking a different way of life.
Along the way she met Vincent Mosemann, who became her friend and later her roommate.
Kat and Vincent came to StoryCorps to talk about what brought them together.
Top Photo: Vincent Mosemann and Kat Valentino at their StoryCorps interview in Oregon on January 26, 2019. By Dupe Oyebolu for StoryCorps.
Originally aired February 4, 2022 on NPR’s Morning Edition.
Bringing Hope and a Love of Horses to L.A. Streets
Ghuan Featherstone grew up in South Central Los Angeles. He has one clear memory of riding a horse for the first time, in Griffith Park, when he was eight years old. It was a feeling that he never forgot, and a lifelong passion was born.
When Ghuan left the military and returned to L.A. years later, he began to immerse himself in the craft of riding and caring for horses. After a tragic fire destroyed his neighborhood stable, Ghuan saw a hole torn into his community. Instead of standing by, Ghuan decided to step forward to found a new stable: Urban Saddles.
Jordan Humphreys riding his horse Winter at the Urban Saddles Stables, in South Gate, California.
He came to StoryCorps with his mentee Jordan Humphreys. At just 13 years old Jordan has become a cornerstone of Urban Saddles.
Top photo: Ghuan Featherstone and Jordan Humphreys at their StoryCorps interview in Los Angeles, California on December 15th, 2021. By Maja Sazdic for StoryCorps.
Originally aired January 28th, 2022 on NPR’s Morning Edition.
He Survived The Holocaust Because Of A Stranger’s Kindness
In 1941, Philip Lazowski and his family were among thousands of Jewish people sent to the Zhetel Ghetto in what was then Poland.
One day, the Lazowski family caught wind that the Nazis were killing Jewish people in the ghetto and they decided to go into hiding. But Philip, just 11 years old, was caught alone by a German soldier after helping his parents and siblings take shelter in a hideout they’d built in their apartment.
Rounded up into the Zhetel marketplace, he saw the soldiers sending children and the elderly to their deaths, but noticed they seemed to be sparing families with adults who had jobs deemed valuable by the Nazis, like doctors, tailors or cobblers.
When he was 91 years old, Rabbi Philip Lazowski came to StoryCorps with his wife, Ruth, 86, to remember a quick decision that saved his life.
Rabbi Philip and Ruth Lazowski on their wedding day, in 1955. Credit: courtesy of the Lazowski family.
Top Photo: Rabbi Philip Lazowski and Ruth Lazowski. Credit: courtesy of the Lazowski family.
Originally aired January 21st, 2022 on NPR’s Morning Edition.
“The Black Vote Matters:” How An Army Veteran Inspired A Teenage Martin Luther King, Jr.
Warning, the following story includes a description of racial violence.
In 1945, World War II US Army veteran Maceo Snipes, returned home to Taylor County, Georgia. He voted in the county’s primary in July of 1946, and the next day, he was murdered by a white mob.
The news of Snipes’ lynching — and the killing of four other African Americans — reached a teenage Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr., then studying at Morehouse College. These murders inspired King to write a letter to the Atlanta Journal Constitution.
A teenage Dr. King’s letter to the editor of the Atlanta Journal Constitution. MLK was a Morehouse College student inspired to speak out following Maceo Snipes’ lynching. Courtesy of The Atlanta Journal-Constitution.
Raynita Snipes Johnson, Maceo Snipes’ great niece, only recently learned of her uncle’s story when she campaigned for Black voting rights in the 2016 presidential election.
Raynita Snipes Johnson at the 16th Street Baptist Church in Birmingham, Alabama. The church was a destination for Martin Luther King, Jr. following a KKK bombing that killed four Black children in 1963. Photo courtesy of Raynita Snipes Johnson.
She sat down with her friend, Gene Robinson, to talk about her uncle’s contribution to the Civil Rights Movement.
Gene Robinson and Raynita Snipes Johnson at their StoryCorps Virtual recording on August 29, 2020.
Find out more about the effort to honor Maceo Snipes’ life at The Maceo Snipes 1946 Project.
Top Photo: United States Army veteran Maceo Snipes. He served in World War II, and was murdered shortly after returning home from service. Photo courtesy of Raynita Snipes Johnson.
This story was recorded in collaboration with the PBS series FRONTLINE as part of Un(re)solved— a major initiative documenting the federal effort to investigate more than 150 cold case murders dating back to the civil rights era. More such stories can be explored in an interactive documentary at Un(re)solved.
Originally aired January 14th, 2022 on NPR’s Morning Edition.
How A Shared Language Helped Two Young People Find Their Voice
In 2006, Luis Paulino immigrated to the U.S. from the Dominican Republic. He was a child and didn’t speak any English, so he struggled during his first year in school.
Four years later — then a senior in high school — he’d meet Angel Gonzalez, who reminded him of his younger self. Angel was also a transfer student from the Dominican Republic, and he was facing challenges that Luis could understand.
Angel Gonzalez and Luis Paulino, in New York, after Luis’s high school graduation in 2011. Courtesy of Angel Gonzalez.
They came to StoryCorps to remember that time, and how they got through it together.
Originally aired January 7th, 2022 on NPR’s Morning Edition.
The Brooklyn EMT Who Saved A Life and Inspired A Nursing Career
In the summer of 1991, 7-year-old Bryan Lindsay was riding his bike in Brooklyn, New York when he was struck by a van and almost killed.
Rowan Allen was the paramedic who arrived on the scene. Almost 20 years later, he and Bryan came to StoryCorps to remember that day and the impact it had on both of their lives.
But Rowan and Bryan weren’t the only ones transformed by the accident. In 2021, Bryan’s mom, Dorothy Lindsay, sat down for a StoryCorps interview with Rowan to thank him for saving her son’s life, and to tell him how his actions inspired her to pursue a new line of work.
Top Photo: Bryan Lindsay, Dorothy Salmon-Lindsay and Rowan Allen at their StoryCorps interview on June 26th, 2013. By Eve Claxton for StoryCorps.
Originally aired December 24th, 2021 on NPR’s Morning Edition.
StoryCorps Alum Turned Bestselling Author Reflects On The Power Of Storytelling
Jason Reynolds is an award winning writer, specializing in novels and poetry for young adults and kids. He started writing poetry at the age of nine, and by 16, he had self-published his first work. He went on to become a #1 New York Times bestselling author, and was also recently appointed the 7th National Ambassador for Young People’s Literature by the Library of Congress.
But before all that, he was a StoryCorps Facilitator.
At the age of 22, he sat down to record with another facilitator for the very first time, to ponder his dreams for the future, and pay tribute to the woman who inspired him.
Isabelle Reynolds and Jason Reynolds, at their StoryCorps recording in 2006. Photo by Justina Mejias for StoryCorps..
Top Photo: Jason Reynolds, on November 15th, 2006. Photo by Jonah Engle for StoryCorps.
The Santa Protest — How One Man’s Firing Became A Fight For AIDS Awareness
In 1989, at the height of the AIDS crisis, Mark Woodley was caring for his dying best friend, while coping with his own HIV status. Although an architect by training, he saw an ad in the Village Voice looking for Macy’s Santas. He applied and got the job. He loved the experience of bringing joy to children, and Macy’s invited him back the following holiday season.
By 1990, he had started taking the drug AZT, which was the primary treatment for AIDS. When he went in for his physical, he was honest about his medication regimen — AZT in combination with Prozac — and he knew he made a mistake.
Mark waited for Macy’s to respond, but no news came about the job. He was called into an HR meeting and told that they wouldn’t be rehiring him back as Santa. He filed a lawsuit against the department store.
Around the same, Jon Winkleman, a young gay man, was taking his first steps into activism with the coalition group ACT UP — along with their subsidiary group Action Tours, which carried out covert direct actions. He read a blurb in the back of the New York Times about Mark’s lawsuit, and he and the group decided to do something about it.
The Action Tours protest at the Macy’s 34th St Store in NYC on Nov 29, 1991. Photo by Meryl Levin.
After the protest, Mark never returned to Macy’s as Santa, but in the following years, he donned the red suit again at different pediatric AIDS clinics and organizations.
After losing his job as Macy’s Santa, Mark Woodley welcomed the chance to play the part for children with H.I.V. at the State University Health Science Center in Brooklyn. Dec. 16th 1994, by Michelle V. Agins, for the NY Times.
Mark eventually moved to Amsterdam, where he opened a small import business. Jon stayed in New York until 2015, when moved back home to Rhode Island. He is still an activist. They connected virtually for StoryCorps almost 30 years to the day of the protest.
Mark Woodley in Amsterdam, and Jon Winkleman in Rhode Island, after their StoryCorps recording on November 22nd, 2021. For StoryCorps.
Top Photo: The Action Tours action at the Macy’s 34th St Store in NYC on Nov 29, 1991. Photo by Meryl Levin.
Originally aired December 10, 2021 on NPR’s Morning Edition.