The body of Air Force Sgt. Leonard Matlovich is buried at Congressional Cemetery on July 2, 1988. Matlovich, recipient of the Bronze Star and Purple Heart in Vietnam, became a gay rights figure during his five-year battle against the Air Force, which discharged him in 1975 for homosexuality. In 1980 Matlovich settled with the Air Force and received an honorable discharge.
Ira Schwartz /AP
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The Fennell family, in a photograph taken in 1999, several years after their kidnapping — posing with the very car they were kidnapped in.
Courtesy of Janette Fennell
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An oral history project called The Great Thanksgiving Listen encourages people to record interviews with loved ones over Thanksgiving weekend.
Courtesy of StoryCorps
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The aircraft hijacked by George Giffe, in Jacksonville, Fla., shortly after the hijacking occurred on Oct. 4, 1971.
Courtesy of Andy Downs
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Feliciano stands at the gravesite of his wife, Rosa. "She's buried here," he says. "So Green-Wood Cemetery is ground zero for me."
Courtesy of Isaac Feliciano
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When he came back from Afghanistan, Army Pfc. Brian Orolin was eager to return to his life as a father and husband. But he had trouble holding on to a sense of purpose, his wife says.
StoryCorps
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Heyn, in action in Baltimore's Fells Point with that night's feature attraction: Jupiter's moons.
Kevin and Sonia McCarthy/Courtesy of Herman Heyn
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Kevin and Sonia McCarthy/Courtesy of Herman Heyn
Roberto Olivera eventually went on to law school at the University of Southern California, and his mother was there to see him graduate.
StoryCorps
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Dr. Martin Couney holds Beth Allen, one of his incubator babies, at Luna Park in Coney Island. This photo was taken in 1941.
Courtesy of Beth Allen
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Yvette Benavidez Garcia and her husband, Rene, dropped by the StoryCorps studios to reminisce about Yvette's father, Roy, a Medal of Honor recipient whose daring rescue mission in Vietnam cast ripples into his later life as a father.
StoryCorps
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Civil rights leader Bayard Rustin, left, and Walter Naegle, right, became partners in the 1970s and were together until Rustin's death. Decades before gay marriage was an option, Rustin adopted Naegle to lend legal protection to their relationship.
StoryCorps
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