Emmett Till Thesis

The event that started the civil rights movement and forever changed american history, started with his murder. Being black in the 1950’s was hard as it is, but being black and a man was even more difficult. With having even harsher consequences for actions. Emmett Till was a fourteen year-old black boy that was brutally tortured to death for making alleged advances towards a white woman, Carolyn Bryant.
Emmett Till was a kind, humorous, and caring boy known by many. At home his mother said that Emmett would cook, clean, do laundry and other household chores while she would work long hours at for the FBI. Mamie Till had decided that she was going to send Emmet to Money,Georgia for two weeks to visit relatives. Prior to his departure by train,

his mother gave him a ring from his late father that had his initials L.T. (Louis Till). The ring was later used to identify his body. A few days after his arrival he would go along with some friends and cousins to Bryant’s Meat and Grocery store. Emmett had bragged to the boys that back home at Chicago that he had a white girlfriend. With disbelief they had sent him to ask for a date from the women sitting behind the cash register. They all approached the counter to pay for their things and left Emmett to pay last. He was left alone for less than a minute, and in that minute no one will no for certain what happened. On the way out Emmet scurried to the car where the boys were waiting and hurried out of the parking lot. On the way out, Emmett Till wolf whistled at Carolyn Bryant.
A few days later was the deciding factor that would end Emmett Till’s life.

Carolyn's husband, Roy Bryant, soon returned from business in those next few days. He heard from others that Till had made advances towards his wife. When he later asked his wife angrily, she claimed that Emmett had grabbed her, harassed her and whispered in her ear inappropriate things. Later Roy and his brother-in-law had gone all around Money looking for him. They finally figured out that Till was the nephew of Moses, the local preacher. They arrived at his house sometime at four in the morning demanding to see Emmett. When they found Emmett asleep they awoke him and forced them into their truck despite protest. What happened after is not completely known. What was testified in court by Bryant and MIlam, was that they only meant to teach him a lesson but he kept talking back and that angered them, and he was eventually shot after a while of torture. Three days later Emmetts body was found in the Tallahatchie river. The body was so messed up that he could not be identified by facial recognition. His uncle had identified him by a ring on his hand that belonged to Till’s late father. His body was sent home to Chicago and the government tried to get his body buried right away so no commotion was made. But his mother decided to have an open casket funeral. Mammie Bradley claimed that “Unless an example is made of the lynchers of Emmett it won’t be safe for any negro to walk the streets anywhere in

America.” Around 50,000 people had passed Emmett's body. Reporters from as far away as London came. The story was national headlines for weeks! The reaction of people would forever change history.
Emmett Till's murder was the great big ripple that started the ripple effect of the civil rights movement. One hundred days after his death, Rosa Parks stayed seated on the bus in Montgomery,Georgia. She thought that if she didn't do anything that how would anything change. That an innocent boy’s life was robbed from him due to the ignorance of a few people. Her action would soon start the Montgomery bus system boycott. Shortly after, one of the most known civil rights activist, Martin Luther King Jr., said “ [ Emmett Till’s murder} Was one of the most brutal and inhumane crimes of the twentieth century”. Some of the more local protest in Money were that the local black residents had stopped shopping and using the catering services of Bryant Meat and Grocery. This had eventually put the Bryants and Milam out of business and have to sell their stores and were left with nothing. In desperate need of money, they had sold their stories to magazines.
Even though this event was tragic, it did lead to more positive outcomes in the end.

After the country had realized the brutality and unjustified act of this murder, rights for people of color started falling into place. NIne years after the Death of Emmett Till and the beginning of the civil rights movement, congress passed the civil rights act of 1964 that banned discrimination and segregation in schools. Only ten years later the government outlawed discriminatory voting practices. A few year prior to all of these momentous event, famous songwriter Bob Dylan, said “ The 1955 trial of Roy Bryant and J.W. Milam is remembered as a turning point in civil rights

history.”
The fourteen-year old who’s tragic murder started all of history’s stories had a story of its own. The thoughts of many from the civil rights time period are quite similar to what people’s current opinions are. In an interview in 2007, Carolyn Bryant said “Nothing that boy did, made him deserve to get killed.” Some of my final thoughts about this topic are that I just wish that people weren’t so ignorant. I think that it is pretty sad that it took so long and so much fighting for something that should have been theirs in the first place. It was even sadder that even after so much wrong MIlam and Roy did that they were found not-guilty. I think that many people didn’t realize at the time, that something so horrific had to happen to open their eyes. I think that it shouldn’t have taken a life, especially an innocent childs, to have start the civil rights movement. I think that looking back at all that happened, it shouldn't have taken a mother to lose her only child just so people of color could earn equal rights. And finally I wish that people would have been more accepting of others and treated everyone fairly.