Emmett Till, who would have turned 82 on Tuesday, and Mamie Till-Mobley changed the course of U.S. history. They deserve this national honor.
A historic Bronzeville church and two sites in Mississippi together will become a new national monument honoring Chicagoans Emmett Till and his mother Mamie Till-Mobley under a proclamation signed Tuesday by President Joe Biden — a move that is as apropos as it is timely.
Till’s murder at the hands of white men Roy Bryant and J.W. Milam in 1955, and his mother’s courageous decision to display her 14-year-old son’s mutilated body during his funeral at Roberts Temple Church of God in Christ, 4021 S. State St. — one of the three new national monument sites — shocked the nation and amplified the Black civil rights movement.Editorials
Emmett Till, who would have turned 82 on Tuesday, and Mamie Till-Mobley changed the course of U.S. history. They deserve this national honor, which is especially appropriate and timely at a time when an honest accounting of Black history in America is increasingly under assault.
