Emmit Tills funeral
On this date in 1955, Emmit Till was murdered.
Till was a 14-year-old African American boy who was beaten and shot to death by two white men. These men then threw Till's mutilated body into the Tallahatchie River near Money, Mississippi. Young Till was killed for talking and perhaps whistling at a white woman at a Mississippi grocery store.
Later that year, Roy Bryant, whose wife Carolyn Bryant was the white woman at the store, and his half-brother, J. W. Milam, were tried for Till's murder and acquitted by a jury of 12 white men.
On December 6, 2021, The Department of Justice announced that it was closing its cold case investigation into the murder of Emmett Till. "Today is a day that we’ll never forget," Rev. Wheeler Parker, Till’s cousin, said at a press conference following the announcement.
