Aug. 28, 1955: The day Emmett Till launched a movement
Few dates outside of Christmas, Thanksgiving or Independence Day mean anything, especially if they are random.
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On that day in 1955, a 14-year-old boy was snatched out of his bed in Money, Miss., by a group of white men. The “crime” that he had committed was allegedly flirting with a white woman.
By the time Emmett Till's battered body washed up three days later in the Tallahatchie River, his death – according to many historians – would spark the beginning of the modern civil rights movement. Till's mother would insist on having an open casket at her son's funeral, so that the world could witness the horror.
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A 10-year-old Shirley Franklin was living in Philadelphia at the time and said Till’s murder radicalized her.
“We talked about it as a family, especially his mother’s decision to have an open casket,” said Franklin, who would go on to become the mayor of Atlanta. “I couldn’t imagine a child being killed and what the impact of having an open casket would mean.”
About the Author
Ernie Suggs is an enterprise reporter covering race and culture for the AJC since 1997. A 1990 graduate of N.C. Central University and a 2009 Harvard University Nieman Fellow, he is also the former vice president of the National Association of Black Journalists. His obsession with Prince, Spike Lee movies, Hamilton and the New York Yankees is odd.
