New Evidence Shakes Up the Emmett Till Case

Discover the shocking truth behind the Emmett Till case and how it unearthed an unexpected story of racism and injustice in Mississippi.

The St. Louis Argus began publishing in 1912 and going on 113 years has never ceased operating.

In fact, today the Argus holds the title for the oldest continuously operating African American-owned business in St. Louis, Missouri. Over the years, the Argus has covered a number of stories, perhaps none more important than Emmett Till’s kidnapping, subsequent murder, and trial of the responsible individuals in 1955. 

Many Argus readers may know that story: Emmett Till was a fourteen-year-old African-American boy from Chicago visiting relatives in Money, Mississippi, who was brutally murdered for whistling at a white woman at a store in a tiny Delta town. His murder and his trial (all convicted parties were eventually acquitted. Although, they later gave a very misleading confession to the murders, half-brothers Roy Bryant and J. W. Milam could not be retried under Double Jeopardy) fueled the Civil Rights movement. Today, whether it’s Michael Brown, LaQuan McDonald, or Tamir Rice, the spectra of Emmett Till hangs over the nation’s treatment of young, black men.

The publisher of the Argus, Mrs. Nannie Mitchell Turner, as well as writer, Steve Duncan, and photographer, William B. Franklin, were among a tiny cadre of black press who’d assembled for the trial.  In fact, the three member staff of the Argus represented the most black members of one news organization—white or black—at the trial. Their voice is crucial to understanding the trial as it actually happened, especially since so few black journalists were there in Sumner to cover the precedent-shaping event.

So, what’s the problem? This is where I come in.  All existing copies of the Argus on microfilm that we could locate were missing September and October 1955 – the two months of the Emmett Till murder and trial.  And yet, we knew from much documented history that the Argus was there—and there in force. In the spring of 2013, I was a senior at Florida State University. I had taken a few courses with Dr. Davis Houck in college, and during my final semester, I was to be his research assistant. At the time, among many other things, he was researching the trial of Emmett Till, as well as lending a hand to friend, Devery Anderson’s, whose remarkable book Emmett Till was just published a few months back. We had major challenges to tracking down the missing microfilm: We were far from Mississippi and far from St. Louis, but the trial When was about to come to life in present-day Tallahassee.  

Davis asked me to look through the microfilm to see if I could find the missing months. So, I researched in the twenty-first century. I wasn’t digging through boxes in the basement of the library in the dead of night; rather, I was sitting on my laptop emailing numerous universities, historical societies, and museums asking for their copy of the microfilm to see if it also was missing the months in question. And, since a lot of these places get their copies of microfilm from one another – they all had the same mistake. That is, until I came across The State Historical Society of Missouri. 

When I finally scrolled across October 1955 I could hardly believe it. I quickly scrolled forward and quickly scrolled back. There was October and November 1955, right in front of my eyes. Throughout the semester, I had been taking notes on my progress in searching for these missing articles. Many entries sounded the same. “I contacted [blank]. Their copy is also missing October and November. Searched through the microfilm from [blank] and [blank]. Missing entries.” However, on March 18, 2013, I simply wrote: “I FOUND THE MISSING ARGUS.” 

We were ecstatic. Among the information the missing two months held, we found numerous pictures that had never been seen by pretty much anyone—including today’s historians. Medgar Evers, the NAACP Field Secretary in Mississippi who helped find key witnesses in the case, was photographed by Mr. Franklin. The articles and pictures help us understand what was happening during the trial, as well as what was happening within the black press, and how the black press reacted to a very defensive and angry white Mississippi.

We quickly shared our discovery with the wider journalistic and academic world; after all, what’s the point in making such a big discovery if you can’t share it with your friends?  In brief, we solved one mystery associated with the Till case.  There remain many more, but getting to work on this one together has been a wonderful collaboration—with a happy ending.

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