Fourteen-year-old African-American Emmett Till is brutally murdered after reportedly flirting with a white woman while visiting relatives in Mississippi. Both black and white reporters cover the trial epitomizing “one of the most shocking and enduring stories of the twentieth century.”² The white defendants, Roy Bryant and J.W. Milam, are acquitted by an all-white jury in only 67 minutes; later they describe in full detail to Look magazine (which paid them $4,000) how they killed Till.³ His mother insists on an open casket at the funeral, and the powerful image of his mutilated body sparks a strong reaction across the country and the world.