Chicago church now a national monument

Posted on August 2, 2023
State officials gathered Tuesday at a ceremony naming the church where Emmett Till lay in an open casket a national monument. (Twitter/Governor JB Pritzker)

By Dave Dahl

CHICAGO – “Without that open casket,” former Congressman Bobby Rush said, “we would not have had that civil rights movement.”

The Chicago church where then-fourteen-year-old Emmett Till lay after being lynched in Mississippi is now one of three locations in the Till story declared a national monument. The other two are in Mississippi, where,  in 1955, accused of whistling at a white woman, Till was killed. She recanted the story shortly before her death, and those accused of killing the Chicago teen were acquitted.

The monument in Chicago, dedicated Tuesday, honors not just Till but also Mamie Till Mobley, who insisted upon an open casket so the world could see what had happened to her son.

But, as U.S. Rep. Jonathan Jackson (D-Chicago) mentioned white people’s contention that slavery taught Blacks useful skills, not everybody believes race relations have progressed much in the 68 years since Till’s death.

Dave Dahl can be reached at [email protected]

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