This casket was part of the whole Burr Oak tragedy when greed took over and they resold plots that were bought and paid for. It was supposed to be used for a memorial or exhibit on
Emmitt Till, but instead it was rusting and home to some possums before the criminal ring at Burr Oak was shut down this summer.
Authorities say there are plans to exhibit the casket that held the body of lynching victim Emmett Till at the Smithsonian Institution's planned National Museum of African American History and Culture in Washington when it opens in 2015.
The glass-topped casket held the 14-year-old Chicagoan's mutilated body for 50 years after his 1955 slaying in Mississippi.
Till's body was exhumed from Burr Oak Cemetery in Alsip in 2005 when the FBI tried to find possible accomplices in the killing.
Till was reburied in a new casket, and the original was found rusting in a shed at Burr Oak recently during investigation of an alleged grave-reselling scandal. Museum officials and members of Till's family were expected to announce the casket's donation just before a memorial ceremony Friday.
When this story came out and I heard Till was buried here I was ready to think that even he didn't escape this criminal activity. Thankfully he did, but his
original casket hadn't. It was just cast aside as if these cemetary workers didn't care if it was an historical relic.
2 comments:
At least some good news comes from this story.
Why would they keep it that long?
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