The Nazi Era: Episode 3: Overview Part II

The Nazi Era: Episode 3: Overview Part II

Author: Eric Marcus February 6, 2025 Duration: 40:08
In our second introductory episode, we focus on life in the Nazi concentration camps and offer a glimpse into the experiences of LGBTQ people in occupied countries during WWII as we continue to set the context for the eight profile episodes to follow. Visit our episode webpage for additional resources, archival photos, and a transcript of the episode. For exclusive Making Gay History bonus content, join our Patreon community. ——— -The following interview segments are from the archive of the USC Shoah Foundation – The Institute for Visual History and Education:  Walter Schwarze, © 1997 USC Shoah Foundation  Kitty Fischer, © 1995 USC Shoah Foundation  For more information about the USC Shoah Foundation, go here. -The Leo Classen excerpt is taken from “Die Dornenkrone: Ein Tatsachenbericht aus der Strafkompanie Sachsenhausen” (“The Crown of Thorns: A Factual Report from the Sachsenhausen Penal Company”), Humanitas: Monatsschrift für Menschlichkeit und Kultur 2, no. 2 (1954): 59-60. -Audio of the 1990 interview with Josef Kohout used by permission of QWIEN, the Center for Queer History in Vienna.  -The Josef Kohout book excerpts are from Heinz Heger’s The Men with the Pink Triangle, Haymarket Books, Chicago, 2023. Used by permission of the publisher. Original German edition Die Männer mit dem rosa Winkel © 1972/2014 MERLIN VERLAG Andreas Meyer Verlags GmbH. & Co. KG, Gifkendorf, Germany. English translation by David Fernbach © 2004 MERLIN VERLAG Andreas Meyer Verlags GmbH. & Co. KG, Gifkendorf, Germany. -The following interview segments are courtesy of the Jeff and Toby Herr Oral History Archive, United States Holocaust Memorial Museum, Washington, D.C.: RG-50.578.0001, oral history interview with Gerald B. Rosenstein RG-50.030.0270, oral history interview with Rose Szywic Warner  RG-50.030.0037, oral history interview with Tiemon Hofman For more information about the United States Holocaust Memorial Museum, go here. -Arthur Haulot audio courtesy of the Fortunoff Video Archive for Holocaust Testimonies, Yale University Library. -The Ovida Delect excerpt is from her memoir La vocation d'être femme (The Vocation to Be a Woman). Copyright © Éditions L'Harmattan, 1996. Used by permission of Éditions L'Harmattan. -The Ruth Maier excerpts are from Ruth Maier’s Diary by Ruth Maier. Copyright © Gyldendal Norsk Forlag AS, 2007. English translation copyright © Jamie Bulloch, 2009. Used by permission of The Random House Group Limited. ——— To learn more about listener data and our privacy practices visit: https://www.audacyinc.com/privacy-policy Learn more about your ad choices. Visit https://podcastchoices.com/adchoices

Eric Marcus brings voices out of the past and into the present with Making Gay History | LGBTQ Oral Histories from the Archive. This isn't a dry historical lecture; it's a collection of intimate conversations, built from rare archival recordings that many thought were lost. Each episode feels like sitting down with someone who was there, offering a personal window into the pivotal moments and everyday struggles that have shaped the LGBTQ community. You'll hear from towering figures of the movement alongside people whose names you might not know-ordinary individuals who displayed extraordinary courage. These are the witnesses, the champions, and the quiet heroes whose stories form the bedrock of this history. Listening, you get the raw, unvarnished emotion in their own words, from the fear and defiance of early activism to the hard-won joys of living authentically. The podcast moves across decades, connecting personal diaries, long-shelved interviews, and firsthand accounts into a powerful, human tapestry. It’s about more than just events; it’s about the lived experience, the culture, and the personal health-both mental and physical-of a community fighting for its place. Through these oral histories, the archive becomes a living, breathing conversation, ensuring that this vital history is remembered not as abstract facts, but as the deeply personal stories it truly is.
Author: Language: English Episodes: 100

Making Gay History | LGBTQ Oral Histories from the Archive
Podcast Episodes
Revisiting the Archive: Episode 4: Shirley Willer [not-audio_url] [/not-audio_url]

Duration: 21:19
“I’ve spent a large percent of my life being angry.” That was Shirley Willer, reflecting on the death of a close friend and fellow nurse who in 1947 received fatally inadequate hospital care because he was gay. Shirley c…
Revisiting the Archive: Episode 3: Wendell Sayers [not-audio_url] [/not-audio_url]

Duration: 20:08
Wendell Sayers understood isolation. Born in western Kansas in 1904, Wendell was the first Black lawyer to work for Colorado’s attorney general; living openly as a gay man wasn’t an option. When he attended meetings of t…
Revisiting the Archive: Episode 2: Edythe Eyde [not-audio_url] [/not-audio_url]

Duration: 17:32
Musical uplift for anxious times. When Eric Marcus interviewed lesbian publishing pioneer Edythe Eyde in 1989, she treated him to a concert for one on her front porch singing her gay songs from the '50s and ‘60s. You can…
Revisiting the Archive: Episode 1: Frank Kameny [not-audio_url] [/not-audio_url]

Duration: 17:32
In 1957, Frank Kameny was fired from his job at the U.S. Army Map Service for being gay. He went on to fight the federal government for 14 years and never lost his resolve. And he won! Inspiration for us all in these cha…
Bonus: From the Vault: Sylvia Rivera & Marsha P. Johnson, 1970 [not-audio_url] [/not-audio_url]

Duration: 22:37
In 1970, a young radio reporter recorded an interview with Sylvia Rivera, Marsha P. Johnson, and other members of the newly formed Street Transvestite Action Revolutionaries—STAR. Nearly 50 years later, MGH unearthed the…
Season 6: Episode 5: Damien Martin [not-audio_url] [/not-audio_url]

Duration: 32:46
Damien Martin grew up in foster care and on the streets of Philadelphia, so he knew all too well about the needs of vulnerable youth. In 1979, when he and his partner, Dr. Emery Hetrick, heard about a 15-year-old gay kid…
Season 6: Episode 4: Nancy Walker [not-audio_url] [/not-audio_url]

Duration: 26:19
In 1976 Nancy Walker joined the Gay Community News, an influential Boston-based weekly paper. She was in her 40s, an outspoken New Yorker, and a moderate pragmatist. Not surprisingly, Nancy and the younger, more radical…
Season 6: Episode 3: Barbara Smith [not-audio_url] [/not-audio_url]

Duration: 23:33
For nearly half a century, Barbara Smith has been speaking truth to power—as a woman against misogyny, as an African American against racism, as a lesbian against homophobia, and as a Black lesbian against those in the g…
Season 6: Episode 2: Vernon E. "Copy" Berg III [not-audio_url] [/not-audio_url]

Duration: 26:29
In 1975, long before “Don’t Ask, Don’t Tell,” the Navy asked, and Officer Copy Berg told: “Yes, I am gay.” When Copy chose to challenge the military’s ban on homosexuals, the Pentagon fought back with all guns blazing. V…
Season 6: Episode 1: Ruth Simpson [not-audio_url] [/not-audio_url]

Duration: 26:45
There’s a war on out there. That was Ruth Simpson’s Stonewall takeaway—and she was ready to fight. But when Ruth pushed the NY chapter of the Daughters of Bilitis to be more political, the FBI and the police took note. V…