I'm Eric Marcus and we're back with season six of making gay history.

Over the coming weeks I'll be sharing with you five new episodes drawn from my archive of more than a hundred

interviews that I recorded decades ago for my oral history book about the

LGBTQ Civil Rights Movement. During season 5 we took a deep dive into the history of the Stonewall Uprising and the year that followed.

So you already know that what happened at Stonewall unleashed the explosive and expansive gay liberation phase of the movement.

Thousands of LGBTQ people join new organizations

across the country

from Worcester to Wichita,

found their voices and demanded to be heard.

In past seasons,

we've already shared several stories from the 1970s that give a sense of how

dynamic, complicated, and contentious these years were.

If you're new to making gay history or need a refresher, go back and listen to our episodes featuring

Gene and Mordy Manford, Fido Russo, Gene O'Leary, and Morris Kite, among others.

This season, we're adding the stories of five more people who came into their own as activist during the 1970s, including Ruth Simpson.

As president of the New York chapter of the Daughters of Belitis, she confronted FBI infiltrators and police harassment.

There's one man called and said,

you know, there are plenty of people working with the FBI and the CIA

and they want to know about people like you.

Sometimes people like you end up dead.

You'll also meet Kapi Berg, one of the first people to challenge the ban on homosexuals serving openly in the military.

I had one commanding officer who is reported to have said that I should have my ring finger cut off because I was still wearing my Annapolis ring.

...