that inviting a loved one, a friend or even a stranger

to record a meaningful interview with you

just might turn out to be one of the most important moments in that person's life,

and in yours.

When I was 22 years old, I was lucky enough to find my calling

when I fell into making radio stories.

At almost the exact same time,

I found out that my dad, who I was very, very close to, was gay.

I was taken completely by surprise.

We were a very tight-knit family,

and I was crushed.

At some point, in one of our strained conversations,

my dad mentioned the Stonewall riots.

He told me that one night in 1969,

a group of young black and Latino drag queens

fought back against the police at a gay bar in Manhattan

called the Stonewall Inn,

and how this sparked the modern gay rights movement.

It was an amazing story, and it piqued my interest.

So I decided to pick up my tape recorder and find out more.

With the help of a young archivist named Michael Shirker,

we tracked down all of the people we could find

who had been at the Stonewall Inn that night.

Recording these interviews,

I saw how the microphone gave me the license

to go places I otherwise never would have gone

and talk to people I might not otherwise ever have spoken to.

I had the privilege of getting to know

some of the most amazing, fierce and courageous human beings

I had ever met.

It was the first time the story of Stonewall

had been told to a national audience.

I dedicated the program to my dad,

it changed my relationship with him, and it changed my life.

Over the next 15 years, I made many more radio documentaries,

working to shine a light on people who are rarely heard from in the media.

Over and over again,

I'd see how this simple act of being interviewed

could mean so much to people,

particularly those who had been told that their stories didn't matter.

I could literally see people's back straighten

as they started to speak into the microphone.

In 1998, I made a documentary about the last flophouse hotels

on the Bowery in Manhattan.

Guys stayed up in these cheap hotels for decades.

They lived in cubicles the size of prison cells

covered with chicken wire

so you couldn't jump from one room into the next.

Later, I wrote a book on the men with the photographer Harvey Wang.

I remember walking into a flophouse with an early version of the book

and showing one of the guys his page.

He stood there staring at it in silence,

then he grabbed the book out of my hand

and started running down the long, narrow hallway

holding it over his head

shouting, "I exist! I exist."

(Applause)

In many ways, "I exist" became the clarion call for StoryCorps,

this crazy idea that I had a dozen years ago.

The thought was to take documentary work

and turn it on its head.

Traditionally, broadcast documentary

has been about recording interviews to create a work of art or entertainment

or education that is seen or heard by a whole lot of people,

but I wanted to try something

where the interview itself was the purpose of this work,

and see if we could give many, many, many people the chance

to be listened to in this way.

So in Grand Central Terminal 11 years ago,

we built a booth where anyone can come to honor someone else

by interviewing them about their life.

You come to this booth and you're met by a facilitator who brings you inside.

You sit across from, say, your grandfather

for close to an hour and you listen and you talk.

Many people think of it as, if this was to be our last conversation,

what would I want to ask of and say to this person

who means so much to me?

At the end of the session, you walk away with a copy of the interview

and another copy goes to the American Folklife Center

at the Library of Congress

so that your great-great-great-grandkids can someday get to know your grandfather

through his voice and story.

So we open this booth in one of the busiest places in the world

and invite people to have this incredibly intimate conversation

with another human being.

I had no idea if it would work, but from the very beginning, it did.

People treated the experience with incredible respect,

and amazing conversations happened inside.

I want to play just one animated excerpt

from an interview recorded at that original Grand Central Booth.

This is 12-year-old Joshua Littman interviewing his mother, Sarah.

Josh has Asperger's syndrome.

As you may know, kids with Asperger's are incredibly smart

but have a tough time socially.

They usually have obsessions.

In Josh's case, it's with animals,

so this is Josh talking with his mom Sarah

at Grand Central nine years ago.

(Video) Josh Littman: From a scale of one to 10,

do you think your life would be different without animals?

Sarah Littman: I think it would be an eight without animals,

because they add so much pleasure to life.

JL: How else do you think your life would be different without them?

SL: I could do without things like cockroaches and snakes.

JL: Well, I'm okay with snakes as long as they're not venomous

or constrict you or anything.

SL: Yeah, I'm not a big snake person --

JL: But cockroach is just the insect we love to hate.

SL: Yeah, it really is.

JL: Have you ever thought you couldn't cope with having a child?

SL: I remember when you were a baby, you had really bad colic,

so you would just cry and cry.

JL: What's colic? SL: It's when you get this stomach ache

and all you do is scream for, like, four hours.

JL: Even louder than Amy does?

SL: You were pretty loud, but Amy's was more high-pitched.

JL: I think it feels like everyone seems to like Amy more,

like she's the perfect little angel.

SL: Well, I can understand why you think that people like Amy more,

and I'm not saying it's because of your Asperger's syndrome,

but being friendly comes easily to Amy,

whereas I think for you it's more difficult,

but the people who take the time to get to know you love you so much.

JL: Like Ben or Eric or Carlos? SL: Yeah --

JL: Like I have better quality friends but less quantity? (Laughter)

SL: I wouldn't judge the quality, but I think --

JL: I mean, first it was like, Amy loved Claudia, then she hated Claudia,

she loved Claudia, then she hated Claudia.

SL: Part of that's a girl thing, honey.

The important thing for you is that you have a few very good friends,

and really that's what you need in life.

JL: Did I turn out to be the son you wanted when I was born?

Did I meet your expectations?

SL: You've exceeded my expectations, sweetie,

because, sure, you have these fantasies of what your child's going to be like,

but you have made me grow so much as a parent, because you think --

JL: Well, I was the one who made you a parent.

SL: You were the one who made me a parent. That's a good point. (Laughter)

But also because you think differently

from what they tell you in the parenting books,

I really had to learn to think out of the box with you,

and it's made me much more creative as a parent and as a person,

and I'll always thank you for that.

JL: And that helped when Amy was born?

SL: And that helped when Amy was born, but you are so incredibly special to me

and I'm so lucky to have you as my son.

(Applause)

David Isay: After this story ran on public radio,

Josh received hundreds of letters

telling him what an amazing kid he was.

His mom, Sarah, bound them together in a book,

and when Josh got picked on at school, they would read the letters together.

I just want to acknowledge that two of my heroes

are here with us tonight.

Sarah Littman and her son Josh, who is now an honors student in college.

(Applause)

You know, a lot of people talk about crying when they hear StoryCorps stories,

and it's not because they're sad.

Most of them aren't.

I think it's because you're hearing something authentic and pure

at this moment, when sometimes it's hard to tell

what's real and what's an advertisement.

It's kind of the anti-reality TV.

Nobody comes to StoryCorps to get rich.

Nobody comes to get famous.

It's simply an act of generosity and love.

So many of these are just everyday people

talking about lives lived with kindness, courage, decency and dignity,

and when you hear that kind of story,

it can sometimes feel like you're walking on holy ground.

So this experiment in Grand Central worked,

and we expanded across the country.

Today, more than 100,000 people in all 50 states

in thousands of cities and towns across America

have recorded StoryCorps interviews.

It's now the largest single collection of human voices ever gathered.

(Applause)

We've hired and trained hundreds of facilitators

to help guide people through the experience.

Most serve a year or two with StoryCorps

traveling the country, gathering the wisdom of humanity.

They call it bearing witness,

and if you ask them,

all of the facilitators will tell you that the most important thing

they've learned from being present during these interviews

is that people are basically good.

And I think for the first years of StoryCorps, you could argue

that there was some kind of a selection bias happening,

but after tens of thousands of interviews with every kind of person

in every part of the country --

rich, poor, five years old to 105,

80 different languages, across the political spectrum --

you have to think that maybe these guys are actually onto something.

I've also learned so much from these interviews.

I've learned about the poetry and the wisdom and the grace

that can be found in the words of people all around us

when we simply take the time to listen,

like this interview

between a betting clerk in Brooklyn named Danny Perasa

who brought his wife Annie to StoryCorps to talk about his love for her.

(Audio) Danny Perasa: You see, the thing of it is,

I always feel guilty when I say "I love you" to you.

And I say it so often. I say it to remind you

that as dumpy as I am, it's coming from me.

It's like hearing a beautiful song from a busted old radio,

and it's nice of you to keep the radio around the house.

Annie Perasa: If I don't have a note on the kitchen table,

I think there's something wrong.

You write a love letter to me every morning.

DP: Well, the only thing that could possibly be wrong

is I couldn't find a silly pen.

AP: To my princess:

The weather outside today is extremely rainy.

I'll call you at 11:20 in the morning.

DP: It's a romantic weather report.

AP: And I love you. I love you. I love you.

DP: When a guy is happily married, no matter what happens at work,

no matter what happens in the rest of the day,

there's a shelter when you get home,

there's a knowledge knowing that you can hug somebody

without them throwing you downstairs and saying, "Get your hands off me."

Being married is like having a color television set.

You never want to go back to black and white.

(Laughter)

DI: Danny was about five feet tall

with crossed eyes and one single snaggletooth,

but Danny Perasa had more romance in his little pinky

than all of Hollywood's leading men put together.

What else have I learned?

I've learned about the almost unimaginable capacity