The Barn: The Secret History of a Murder in Mississippi

Content Warning: This section of the guide includes discussion of death, child death, and racism.

On New Year’s Day in 1955, Rill posed for one photo alone and another with his mother. Those photographs became famous, as they were the ones that Mamie gave to the newspapers when Till was missing. 

In early January, Till asked his mother for more responsibility. He wanted to pay her bills for her, which entailed carrying cash to vendors in Chicago. Despite her worries, Mamie allowed him to do so. He carried out the task well. Till hoped to be a motorcycle policeman. Known as “Bobo,” he enjoyed telling jokes.

In March of 1955, the British Parliament voted against subsidizing the cotton industry and effectively ended the Industrial Revolution. By that point, cotton stocks had plummeted. Oil replaced cotton as the most valuable commodity, and synthetics replaced cotton. British investors withdrew their capital from the Mississippi Delta as a result.

In Mississippi, politicians were responding hysterically to the Brown v. Board decision. They placed more impediments on Black Americans voting and made it a crime for a white person to attend the same school as a Black person. In the race for Mississippi governor, all five candidates campaigned on segregation.