davis hopper.jpgWe’re justifying posting something from a few days ago with the excuse that no one was paying attention to much of anything on the internet on Friday. We know that over here, we filled the sink (yeah, we have a sink in our office. Not sure why) with ice and started in with the beer pretty early in the day.

So if you’re lazy like us you didn’t listen to NPR’s Morning Edition on Friday to hear StoryCorps’ story about Ken Hopper and Kerry Davis, who’ve worked on the Golden Gate Bridge for the last 25 years.

In their role as ironworkers on the bridge, Davis and Hopper wear harnesses attaching them to the structure — which means they have been called upon to assist when folks have gone over the safety rail in an effort to end their lives.

It’s a brief, but kind of amazing little piece about some “ordinary” folks who’ve had to do some pretty extraordinary stuff. You can read the transcript of the NPR segment here, or (since we’re having issues getting the NPR audio to load) hear the audio on the StoryCorps site here.

Photo of Ken Hopper and Kerry Davis: StoryCorps

the author

Eve Batey is the editor and publisher of the San Francisco Appeal. She used to be the San Francisco Chronicle's Deputy Managing Editor for Online, and started at the Chronicle as their blogging and interactive editor. Before that, she was a co-founding writer and the lead editor of SFist. She's been in the city since 1997, presently living in the Outer Sunset with her husband, cat, and dog. You can reach Eve at eve@sfappeal.com.

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