Let's go back to 1969 for a second.

You're 18 years old and you've just moved to New York City.

And you're gay.

And you want to meet other gay people.

So what do you do?

You go to Christopher Street and you walk up and down with everyone else and pop into places

like the Stonewall Inn.

The Stonewall was a safe place.

Or a safe-ish place. They were police raids,

but that wasn't unusual by any means, but it was a safe enough place to put your arm around

another person, to hold hands, to dance. And that is what Mark Siegel did. Mark arrived in

New York City at the age of 18 in May of 1969, and a few short weeks later,

he was there at Stonewall the night the uprising began. He was also there the next night,

and the next night and the night after that, Mark is known for saying that Stonewall lasted

365 days. Stonewall ignited something in Mark, and it kicked off his lifelong commitment to activism.

On one now famous occasion, Mark snuck into the CBS Evening News News Newsroom and interrupted

a live broadcast with Walter Cronkite while weaving a banner that read, Gaze Protest, CBS

Prejudice. That show had 60 million viewers.

And repeating that kind of thing, he made such a name for himself that he then started

to get booked as a guest on shows.

Almost every talk show had him on.

This was the early 70s, and with so few outgay people anywhere, he garnered a massive

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