Chris Crowe

Like his newfound friend Emmett Till, Hiram hails from the north and is visiting relatives who live in small-town Mississippi. It is through his interactions with Emmett that Hiram is able to see the difference between how he is treated as a white person, and Emmett is treated so very differently because of his skin color. Surprised at the bigotry, this young man will soon experience a life-changing event.

In particular, Hiram is ashamed to observe that his grandfather is also racist, noting show more that blacks need to "know their place. " This story is told from the perspective of Hiram who is confused about why the hatred of blacks is so embedded in the southern culture.

Emmett Till perhaps made a mistake in touching the hand of a white woman when he paid for his purchases at the Bryant small store. Perhaps he whistled at her to showing off to his southern cousins. But, Emmett was a stutter, and to stop stuttering, Emmett whistled.

Emmett is new to the ways of the south. Living in Chicago is far less bigoted. No one was in the store to observe Emmett's actions with Carolyn Bryant. The boys with Emmett may have heard a whistle, but even they were not sure if it was intentionally given to Mrs. Bryant.

The depth of the story lies with the ethics of Hirim, who was concerned when Emmett Till went missing. And then, days later, boys fishing found Emmett's dead body. It was floating in the top of the river and a large object was holding him there.

When the sheriff arrives to get the body, he sees a bloated, severely beaten young boy who was so battered his eye was not in the socket, he could only be identified by a ring he wore.

The dilemma that Hirim faces is trying to find the culprit who so brutally killed his friend. His journey to find who did this takes Hirim to the deep bigotry of the town, and the price Emmett had to pay for not obeying the rules of the south, was that he lost his life.

And now, if Hirim continues to dig into the truth, he too may pay a heavy price, and the information he knows is not easy to carry. show less

Chris Crowe’s take on the Emmett Till Case is as comprehensive and compelling a document that comes in at just over 120 pages. He wastes little time and space with hyperbole or sensationalism, gets to the heart of the matter, and sets the scenes with a global perspective – one gets the sense that you are reading a much larger, longer book. He is unsparing and hardly sentimental; true, it should not be hard to find one’s sympathies with Emmett and his mother, Mamie Till Bradley. But his show more honesty about the brutal, ugly face of racism in America is refreshing because it is free of preachy commentary: the facts are powerful enough. The truth is overwhelming enough, and yet, even faced with the truth, the good people of Mississippi valued their vaunted Southern chivalry, Christian lifestyle, and racist livelihoods more than returning a just verdict; at least they were true to the cause and sincere in their sentiments, and Crowe makes certain we feel disgust at their responses and reactions. His sparse and unsparing presentation is as stark and visceral as any photo, as though a documentary-maker's film continued running all throughout. His recreation of the courtroom scenes – accompanied by photographs from the trial itself – makes the reading feel as familiar to those of us already acquainted with these dastardly moments from American history. For mature students in the middle school grades or high school students. show less

This book strikes such a deep emotional chord that it is nearly as difficult to review as it was to read. With phrases such as “integration was a Communist/Socialist plot to destroy America” (p. 31) and a trial that played out like that of Trayvon Martin, I had to keep at the forefront of my mind that what I was reading did, in fact, happen more than 60 years ago. But it still happens today.
The author does a great job of focusing on the events of mid-century America and letting the show more reader draw his or her own connections to the modern day. He fully sets the stage for these events, including details such as the opening of McDonald’s, helping to transport readers into the past. The final chapter, “Aftershocks,” updates the events to the point of the fortieth anniversary of Emmett’s murder in 1995, but goes no further. A photograph of Mamie Till on that anniversary is the only non-contemporary photograph within the book. The many primary sources concretely place the reader in the 1950’s.
Throughout the book, “Black” is capitalized while “white” is not when referring to the color of a human’s skin. This gave me pause. After some research, I agreed with the author’s use of capitalization. An author’s note on his usage would have been important to include, especially to make this a better teaching tool and clarify his intentions to a young and impressionable audience. A time line, bibliography, and list of additional resources a great, but an index and glossary are noticeably missing and could have been helpful regarding this book being a teaching tool.
Despite being such a difficult book to digest, I highly recommend this book to anyone old enough to deal with the tragic subject matter and gruesome photograph of Emmett Till’s body. The description of the trial becomes tedious to read, but is entirely necessary to convey an understanding of how unfair were the proceedings. On page 60, the author describes his sources: trial transcripts and post-trial interviews. He points out that "where the sources don't agree, the trial testimony takes precedence over the...interviews." In other parts of the book, like on pages 54 and 55, he makes it clear that we do not and will never know exactly what words were said and what actions played out in that rural shop so many decades ago. He does not try to fill in unknown details for the sake of good story telling, but presents multiple viewpoints and accounts of the story, acknowledging contradictions and the fallacy of human memory. show less

Genius. Be sure to read the author's note at the end of the book--so good. While this book takes place in 1968, there are so so so many parallels to how I'm feeling in 2017 (book was published in 2014). What that tells me is that while many things around me change, some stay the same--both for good and ill. And the constants that are "ill" show me how much work there is to do, and probably always will need to be done.