Day 186, Emmett Till....

  Today in my US Government class, we learned about Emmett Till. After I learned about him, I was shocked that know one really know, or has heard about him, and actually it makes me a little mad.

This is his story...

In the 1950s segregation was a big part of the U.S. In Mississippi, it was really bad! Colored men couldn't even walk on the same sidewalk as a white woman, let alone look at her. But, in Chicago, it wasn't as bad. They were some what accepted in the community, but there were separated, separate bathrooms, drinking fountains, stores, etc.

Emmett Till

  Emmett Till was a 14 year old black boy. He was full of humor, and happiness. The summer that he turned 14, he took a trip to Mississippi, which is where his mother was from. His mother told him about the people in Mississippi, and what they thought towards colored people. She told him the rules, and told him to obey.
 
Emmett soon waved goodbye to his mother, and entered the train for the long trip to Mississippi. During his first two weeks of his vacation, him and his friends work, and played. But one day, after working in the morning, Emmett and his friends went to a local candy shop. Emmett bought some bubble gum, and as he was walking out of the store, he whistled a little toon. The white woman who owned the store thought that he was whistling to her, which wasn't true. She was so mad, and she told her husband.

  Her husband was so mad that he got his brother, and together in the middle of the night, the kidnapped Emmett. They later beat him really really bad, then shot him in the head. They took the body to a local river, and tied barbed wire around his neck with a cinder block, and pushed him in.

  People didn't know where he was for weeks, but they knew something bad had happened. After a few days, a fisherman found his body floating down the river.

Emmett's body after the murder.

 Emmett's body was so beaten up, that they couldn't tell it was him. They only way they did know it was him was because of the ring he was wearing, which was his fathers.

 To make a long story short, his mom was so upset, and she wanted change. She had his body on display for 3 days for everyone to see, they said that 1 out of 5 people would faint at the sight of his body because they were so shocked.

  The men who killed young Emmett didn't face any jail time, and they walked away from the trial free men.

  It makes me SO sick that this happened! I can't believe people thought like that, and some even still do! I wish I could go back in time, and stand up, and do something about it, teach someone a lesson!