The South Side church where 14-year-old Emmett Till’s battered body was displayed in an open casket, lighting fire to the Civil Rights Movement, was designated one of America’s 11 Most Endangered Historic Places on Thursday, an annual list that brings preservation support.
Roberts Temple Church of God In Christ, at 4021 S. State St. in Bronzeville, makes the National Trust for Historic Preservation’s list in a year where the 11 sites span the most diverse of American heritage and cultures, against the backdrop of a national reckoning with race in wake of the heinous killing of George Floyd by a white police officer in Minneapolis.
The endangered list ranges from the Alazan-Apache Courts public housing development for a Mexican-American community in San Antonio, Texas, to Harada House in Riverside, California, owned by a Japanese family forcibly incarcerated in Japanese Internment Camps in 1942; to the historical capital of the Monacan Indian Nation in Columbia, Virginia, Rassawek.
“Mamie Till Mobley’s courage — and Roberts Temple’s willingness to open its doors to anyone who wanted to bear witness to the ravages of racial hatred — changed our nation forever. The National Trust believes that we must work together to ensure that this place, so important to our country’s history, is preserved to tell its powerful story for future generations,” said the Trust’s Chief Preservation Officer Katherine Malone-France.
The designation for the church is the second preservation nod within a month for Chicago sites central to Till’s story.
The Commission on Chicago Landmarks on Sept. 3 bestowed preliminary landmark status on the home where Till lived at 6427 S. St. Lawrence Ave., in Woodlawn, before that fateful trip Down South ending with his brutal lynching on Aug. 28, 1955. The church had been designated a Chicago landmark in 2006.
In a visit to family in Money, Mississippi, the teen was kidnapped from his uncle’s home on Aug. 28, 1955, for allegedly whistling at a white woman at a grocery store. His body was recovered Aug. 31, 1955, from the Tallahatchie River, barbed wire wrapped around his neck, face beaten beyond recognition, his body weighted down with a cotton gin fan.
“There’s nothing like an idea whose time has come,” the Rev. Wheeler Parker Jr., 81, who is Emmett Till’s cousin and today the last living witness to the horrific events of 1955, said of the national designation at a news conference in the sanctuary of the church Thursday.
“I’ve been sitting here thinking about when I was here for the funeral. I remember sitting about middle-ways over there,” he said, pointing out where he’d sat in 1955.
“A lot of things just started coming to my mind, and I can remember sitting there saying, ‘I’ll see him again. That’s not Emmett. I’ll see him again.’ And I’ve lived with that since 65 years ago,” said Parker, now pastor of the Argo Temple Church of God in Christ in far south suburban Argo, which was founded by Till’s grandmother, Alma Carthan.
“Emmett and I traveled to Mississippi together. I caught the train down at 12th Street, that’s where it was then. He caught it at 63rd & Rochester. We were not there long before he was kidnapped, savagely beaten, shot in the head, weighted down and thrown in the Tallahatchie River, never to be seen again,” said Parker, currently completing his memoir, “A Few Days: Full of Trouble,” due out early next year.
“Of course, as God had it, [Emmett] floated downstream, his body snagged, and his foot was bobbing up, and that’s how we were able to see him again,” he said.
“I always felt — I don’t know the proper word — but when I was in [Mamie’s] presence, I was always conscientious that I came back and he [Emmett] didn’t. And when you feel that, it gives you a certain feeling,” Parker added.
“His mother’s wishes and dream was, ‘I hope he didn’t die in vain. I hope he didn’t die in vain.’ Mamie asked me to carry on, along with my wife, the legacy of her son, and I just thank God that I was able to do that.”
Emmett Till’s cousin, Rev. Wheeler Parker Jr., 81, stands inside Roberts Temple Church of God in Christ at 4021 S. State St. in Bronzeville, Thursday afternoon, Sept. 24, 2020. The church, which is where Till’s battered body was displayed in an open casket, helping to spark the Civil Rights Movement, was placed on a list of the nation’s most endangered historic places.
Ashlee Rezin Garcia/Sun-Times
Annually, the 11 Most Endangered Historic Places list spotlights architectural and cultural treasures nationwide at risk of loss through destruction or irreparable damage, without applied action and advocacy. Of the more than 300 important cultural landmarks declared under imminent threat in 33 years, 95 percent have been saved.
“Though listed as a Chicago Landmark for its association with Emmett Till’s funeral, the church today has severe structural issues and is only minimally used by the congregation. To ensure long-term viability, the building needs rehabilitation funding and partnerships,” the Trust said of Roberts Temple.
Founded in 2016, the church was expanded to include a second-floor sanctuary, gothic-style windows and an exterior red brick façade. Church leaders Thursday said they are working to assess the building’s condition and develop a strategy to address its structural issues, restore it to its 1955 state — when more than 100,000 people filed through to pay their respects to the Till family — and allow its continued use as a church and community anchor.
