Essential workers who helped New York City through the COVID-19 pandemic were honored Wednesday with a parade up Broadway — nurses, doctors, first responders, teachers, bus drivers and more riding on floats through a canyon of tall buildings and falling confetti. The parade stretched from Battery Park to City Hall, led up Broadway in lower Manhattan by grand marshal Sandra Lindsay, a health care worker who was the first person in the country to get a COVID-19 vaccine shot after they were authorized for public use.

Nearly 60 years ago, dozens of soldiers assembled for a top secret mission to Vietnam, three years before President Lyndon Johnson officially sent U.S. combat troops to the country. They never made it. Their airplane disappeared between Guam and the Philippines, leaving behind no trace. On Saturday, families of more than 20 of the fallen soldiers were on hand for the unveiling of a memorial in Columbia Falls, Maine, to honor those who perished when the plane disappeared over the Pacific Ocean.

Much like the round clock faces, gears and planets that often populate his artwork, Robert Seaman has come full circle. Seaman, 88, has been drawing since he was a boy, and at age 60, left a real estate career to pursue his hobby professionally. But it took the coronavirus pandemic to fully return him to his passion. Tuesday marked one year since Seaman started churning out “daily doodles” from his small, one-room apartment at the Maplewood Assisted Living facility in Westmoreland, New Hampshire. He spends about six hours a day working on his intricate, fanciful illustrations, starting with pencil sketches and finishing with ink, colored pencil and watercolor.