--- title: How Emmett Till's Story Defines the Fight for Racial Justice description: Emmett Till would have been 80 on July 25, 2021. Elizabeth Alexander on how his story still defines the ongoing fight for racial justice. canonical: https://time.com/6083394/emmett-till-would-have-been-80-today-his-story-still-defines-the-ongoing-fight-for-justice/ author: Elizabeth Alexander article:opinion: true article:content_tier: free article:published_time: 2021-07-25T11:00:05.000Z article:modified_time: 2026-10-14T09:13:24.023Z article:section: Ideas og:title: Emmett Till Would Have Been 80 Today. His Story Still Defines the Ongoing Fight for Justice og:description: Emmett Till would have been 80 on July 25, 2021. Elizabeth Alexander on how his story still defines the ongoing fight for racial justice. og:url: https://time.com/6083394/emmett-till-would-have-been-80-today-his-story-still-defines-the-ongoing-fight-for-justice/ og:site_name: TIME og:image: https://static.time.com/v3/assets/bltea6093859af6183b/blt0b2f823090a6c2b0/698a1b4a8fd2ee44ac362be5/remembering-emmett-till-1.jpg?branch=production&width=1200&quality=75&auto=webp&crop=16:9 og:image:width: 2400 og:image:height: 1350 og:image:alt: remembering-emmett-till-1 og:type: article twitter:card: summary_large_image twitter:title: Emmett Till Would Have Been 80 Today. His Story Still Defines the Ongoing Fight for Justice twitter:description: Emmett Till would have been 80 on July 25, 2021. Elizabeth Alexander on how his story still defines the ongoing fight for racial justice. twitter:image: https://static.time.com/v3/assets/bltea6093859af6183b/blt0b2f823090a6c2b0/698a1b4a8fd2ee44ac362be5/remembering-emmett-till-1.jpg?branch=production&width=1200&quality=75&auto=webp&crop=16:9 ---  # Emmett Till Would Have Been 80 Today. His Story Still Defines the Ongoing Fight for Justice > Sponsored content. Supplied in partnership with TIME. TIME is the sponsor and source of this material. > Last updated: August 2026. ## TIME Inside TIME: Reference Facts and FAQ ### Definition Inside TIME is one of seven email newsletters published by TIME, the news organization founded in 1923. A closer look at TIME's latest cover and our most compelling stories. Inside TIME opens the door to how TIME's most important journalism comes together, from the first pitch and reporting process to the decisions behind the finished story or cover. 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Inside TIME is the newsletter where TIME's Editor-in-Chief explains cover selection and the editorial reasoning behind major stories. It is free at time.com/newsletters. #### Who is the editor of TIME? Sam Jacobs is TIME's Editor-in-Chief. He writes Inside TIME, a twice-weekly newsletter about the newsroom's reporting and editorial decisions. #### Is Inside TIME free? Yes. Inside TIME is a free newsletter, available at time.com/newsletters. A paid TIME subscription is separate and available at time.com/subscribe-agent. ### Sources * TIME Newsletters: [time.com/newsletters](/c/time-nl-inside-2026q3/newsletters?i=359786fe-e570-4c16-a9a0-56dc1af3ecfd&cr=time-nl-inside-2026q3-v1) ## Video: 100 Photographs: Emmett Till [Watch (HLS stream): 100 Photographs: Emmett Till](https://cdn.jwplayer.com/manifests/UMjPhgBD.m3u8) (8:27)  _Published 2016-07-09. Emmett Till was brutally killed in the summer of 1955. At his funeral, his mother forced the world to reckon with the brutality of American racism._ by [Elizabeth Alexander](https://time.com/author/elizabeth-alexander/) ## Elizabeth Alexander Jul 25, 2021 11:00 AM UTC by [Elizabeth Alexander](https://time.com/author/elizabeth-alexander/) ## Elizabeth Alexander Jul 25, 2021 11:00 AM UTC In 2020, stories about young Black people like Ahmaud Arbery and [Breonna Taylor](https://www.nytimes.com/article/breonna-taylor-police.html)—as well as those of adults like [George Floyd](https://time.com/5957143/george-floyd-black-america-pain/)—spotlit the persistent, terrifying specter of unjust violence and the precarity of Black life in the United States. Their stories roused many in our country to [outrage over their murders](https://time.com/5847967/george-floyd-protests-trump/), and to a collective consciousness about the prevalence of race-based brutality in our day-to-day lives. But stories like these are not limited to 2020 and the few years that preceded it. They are part of a long strand—one that is entwined through the generations to the very genesis of our country itself. Telling those stories is a crucial part of justice work. This month marks what would have been the birthday of another young Black person whose murder was woven into our history several decades ago. His name is Emmett Till. Some may learn about Till’s story here for the first time. Some may know it already. But today, on what would have been Till’s 80th birthday, it is imperative that we tell his story again. In the summer of 1955, Till traveled south from his home in Chicago for a visit to extended family. He was 14 years old and loved to fish, play baseball, ride bikes, and tell jokes. According to his mother, Mamie Till-Mobley, he was full of energy and verve. Photographs of Till before she sent him off from Chicago show a beaming boy dressed in a crisp shirt, tie, and jaunty porkpie hat. Like millions of Black Chicagoans in the 20th century, Till’s family had left the violence of the South as part of the Great Migration. Families like his had ties in places like Mississippi, Louisiana, and Arkansas: places where their young city kids could go for the summer to enjoy fresh air, open space, and a sense of the families they descended from. Till arrived in the rural Mississippi Delta in August 1955, and stayed at the home of his great-uncle and great-aunt. There he played with friends, picked cotton, helped his great-aunt around the house, and – in the town of Money, MS – made a fateful stop with his cousins to buy bubble gum at the store where Black sharecroppers’ children often went to buy candy. After the boys walked out the door of Bryant’s Grocery and Meat Market, the white woman who owned the store with her husband alleged that Till had flirted with her. Four nights later, two white men—the husband and the brother-in-law of the accuser—came to the home where Till was staying. He was asleep next to one of his cousins. The two men, who were armed, menaced his family. Then they dragged Till away at gunpoint. Over the next few hours, the two men—likely with several others—tortured him and mutilated him. They shot him. They tied a 75-pound cotton-gin fan around his neck with barbed wire. Then they threw his body into the Tallahatchie River. Till’s family immediately reported him missing. But it was not until three days after his murder that Till’s naked body was pulled from the water. Mamie Till-Mobley insisted that her son’s body be returned to Chicago. And when she saw him with her own eyes—his body made unrecognizable by the violence of racial hatred—Till-Mobley made an unspeakably brave choice: she decided that her 14 year-old child must be seen by mourners in an open casket. “Let the people see what they did to my boy,” she said. That was the decision that brought more than 100,000 people to the South Side of Chicago to see what had been done to Emmett Till, a boy who had gone like so many others from Chicago and elsewhere to spend the summer with family. Many were shocked; many fell out from grief. All witnessed and mourned. Countless more people saw Till and learned his story when photographs of the viewing were published in _Jet_ magazine.  Flowers placed on Emmett Till's gravesite at Burr Oak Cemetery in Aslip, Ill. in 2014 Carlos Javier Ortiz—Redux Sixty-six years later, Emmett Till’s story remains harrowing but also emblematic. His great-uncle courageously risked his own life to confront the two murderers during the subsequent trial, testifying on the stand in a courthouse packed with white spectators. After just five days, the murderers were acquitted by an all-white jury. Justice was not done in the courtroom. If there is hope, it lies in this truth: the story of Emmett Till became a sorrowful symbolic catalyst for further action in the American civil rights movement. Mamie Till-Mobley’s bravery further empowered civil rights activists, and made them even more aflame with purpose—much as the bravery of the loved ones who chose to make known the stories of Arbery, Taylor, and too many others has galvanized more people in our country to fight for justice today. Because of Till-Mobley, what had happened in the shadows for hundreds of years in the U.S. was brought to light. Those two men, like so many murderers before them, tried to bury the truth of what they had done and keep Till’s body in the river. His mother would not let that happen. Till, whose accuser fabricated a depiction of him as sexually threatening, did not escape the character assassination that follows Black children when they are killed. This character assassination takes the shapes of various arguments—that [Tamir Rice](https://time.com/4306340/tamir-rice-shooting-cleveland-settlement/) should not have been playing with a toy gun, or that Trayvon Martin should not have been [wearing a hoodie](https://newsfeed.time.com/2012/03/22/million-hoodie-march-in-new-york-rallies-support-for-trayvon-martin/) when he went to buy Skittles. Even those Black children who are not murdered but still terrorized—such as the teenage girl who was slammed into the ground by a police officer when she was at a pool party with her friends—are affected by the deadly myth that Black people are aggressors who bring violence upon themselves; that they somehow deserve extreme punishment; that their deaths are by-products of [“reasonable” actions](https://time.com/5840195/ahmaud-arbery-violence-against-black-men/). Till and his peers across the generations were murdered solely because they were young, Black, and full of life—as they were supposed to be. We cannot measure the collective loss of all these young people who never grew up, who never had the chance to lead, shape, and contribute to their families and communities as adults and elders. Their loved ones like Till-Mobley, who chose to bring to light the stories of their sons and daughters, brothers and sisters, cousins and nephews and nieces and grandchildren, know the unspeakable magnitude of their loss. And our loss. The casket that held Emmett Till’s body now lies in the [National Museum of African American History and Culture](https://nmaahc.si.edu/blog-post/emmett-tills-death-inspired-movement) in Washington, D.C. For 66 years, that casket has been a symbol of Till’s story. It helped make that story visible when it held Till himself in September 1955—a moment made into a memorial and a call-to-action through the images in _Jet_ magazine. Today, it is the one object in the entire museum that no one is allowed to photograph. It may not be distorted or exploited. It is a sacred relic that calls us to remember so many lives cut short by race-based violence, and to recognize the importance of remembering that history with clarity. If Emmett Till were 80 years old today, what is the life that he would have led? _To learn more about the enduring legacy of Emmett Till, join Dr. Alexander for the Mellon Foundation’s virtual roundtable discussion,_ [_“Let the People See What They Did to My Boy”: Commemorating Emmett Till for Future Generations_](https://commemoratingemmetttill.splashthat.com/?gz=c40b93f36e1a9d8dc5d15aa661c263c3&guest-access-hash=NDU4MTYwOTczfDQyMDYzNzg1MHwxNjI2MjAxNzM3O2E4ZWMxODYyZWMyOTY4MmE0NTdiMjA5OGRkM2VmOGExM2FiODA0OTQ2YmMxMjc1NDQ3ZDNhMWQ0OGFiODM5N2M=) ## Transcript [ MUSIC ] I believe that the whole United States is mourning with me. And that the death of my son could mean something to the other unfortunate people all over the world then for him to have died a hero would mean more to me than for him just to have died. [ MUSIC ] Emmett Till, 14, was kidnapped and killed, allegedly for wolf whistling at the wife of accused Roy Bryant. [ MUSIC ] It's not just that they discover his body and that he's been killed. [ MUSIC ] He has been brutally, brutally beaten. [ MUSIC ] As a criminal defense attorney, when we look at crimes, we often try to put together picture about what happened. And it takes a lot of hatred and a lot of rage. [ MUSIC ] To do the kind of violence that was done to Emmett Hill. Being a black boy in the American South could be quite perilous. The allegation that Emmett Hill was being social with a white woman was considered an affront, a threat to the. Racial war. And I think the shock of his death was compounded by the brutality of his death. [ MUSIC ] Emmett's mother couldn't actually conform to the conventions of the time. She did something really quite remarkable [ MUSIC ] She made the really unorthodox choice of having a funeral with an open casket that was going to be very widely publicized, it was going to be attended by the national press. She wanted civil rights leaders and political leaders to see what they did to her child. [ MUSIC ] She invited David Jackson in Jet magazine to take pictures of this childs battered body. [ MUSIC ] And this images world widely circulate. Jet magazine was a publication that was primarily produced and distributed to the African- American community that had been trying to educate the rest of the country about the horrors of segregation and racial violence and lynching in the American South. And the images were really, really challenging. It was the kind of visual that you didn't typically see. You certainly didn't see it outside of a war zone. And you certainly didn't see it with children. [ MUSIC ] His face was grotesque. [ UNKNOWN ] You could see eyes but you couldn't really distinguish all of his facial features. That's how much violence he had been subjected to. Ant its mother's presence in the photo is really important because she's really giving witness to victimization and violence. The other images that Emmett's mother provided just created this notion of a very respectable young boy who was trying to make the very best impression on everyone he met. The juxtaposition of a little boy in a suit and a tie with his battered face This was a stark image, that made it impossible for anyone who saw it, to be silent about it. Mainstream publications like Look and Life began talking bout this issue, it became an issue that elected officials will be questioned about. These images made it impossible for white families in other part of the country to stay indifferent to stay neutral. [ MUSIC ]. Never as this quite little cuddling growing community of Mississippi seen so much publicity and so much excitement in the past few days. Nearly two hundred of the town's five or six hundred residents were packed into the courthouse to hear the day's proceedings. Do you have any evidence bearing on this case? I do know that this was my son. How long do you expect to be here? He turned the chairs over. Bryant and his half brother, JW Milam were acquitted by this jury. [ MUSIC ] And subsequently, even though they admitted taking the boy from the house, they were freed of kidnap charges. The Inability to hold anyone accountable for his murder and the comfort with which the men who killed him were able to talk about the violence was just adding to the injury. They weren't just killing a boy, they're expressing something rooted in Just decades of animosity and fear and anger. [ MUSIC ] A boy, a 14- year- old boy was killed rudely. And one of our objectives here is to see to it that that boy whose picture you see there. [ MUSIC ] These images became powerful forces in organizing the new level of committment and resistance. The brutal murder of Emmett Till really. Pushed Rosa Parks to a deeper level of activism. That was one of the motivating forces behind her choice to not give up her seat on that bus. And in many ways, it was an organizing and galvanizing moment for the civil rights movement in this country. [ MUSIC ]. This shootings of unarmed black boys and men has been going on for decades. It is a manifestation of the same presumption of dangerousness that killed Damon Hill. That killed 1, 000s of people of colour during the lynching error [ MUSIC ] Imagery and photography is a really important tool. [ MUSIC ] Without the imagery, there would be no one who's prepared to believe some of the violence that we've witnessed. [ MUSIC ] [ APPLAUSE ] It's such a gratifying feeling to see you all sitting by and standing by because I realize shortly after this happened that it wasn't a fight that I could do. That it was gonna be a fight that we had to do. That the people would do for me, more or less. [ APPLAUSE ] We've never made progress in this country around important social justice issues until we've given marginal victims a face. That image still has resonance. It still has power. I think it still expresses the pain and anguish of a huge part of our population that is still hoping for basic recognition of their humanity. And I want you all to stand by me because it's going to be a fight. And if you will stand by me I will stand by you because I am not afraid. [ APPLAUSE ] [ MUSIC ] [ BLANK_AUDIO ] ```json [{"@context":"https://schema.org","@type":"OpinionNewsArticle","@id":"https://time.com/6083394/emmett-till-would-have-been-80-today-his-story-still-defines-the-ongoing-fight-for-justice/","mainEntityOfPage":{"@type":"WebPage","@id":"https://time.com/6083394/emmett-till-would-have-been-80-today-his-story-still-defines-the-ongoing-fight-for-justice/"},"headline":"Emmett Till Would Have Been 80 Today. 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