Editor’s note: Today’s column discusses lynching and other violence toward Black people.
Mother’s Day is filled with tributes to the ideals of those who nurture, raise, and protect children. It is a time of celebration of mothers and how much they mean to all of us. The modern American celebration of Mother’s Day is thanks to an actual memorial service honoring the mother of Anna Jarvis and all mothers in 1908 in Grafton, West Virginia. While there are many ceremonies for Mother’s Day, sometimes called Mothering Sunday in other parts of the world, the emphasis on saying “thanks” to moms everywhere remains paramount.
In the United States, the second Sunday in May is set aside to honor for Mother’s Day with flowers, a nice meal, or gifts that are personally meaningful for the individual. Over time, commercialization has transformed Mother’s Day into a business opportunity regardless of the industry. Outdoor loving mothers mothers can fish for free on Mother’s Day weekend in Minnesota. Baseball moms can stream games all weekend for free. Some local attractions offer free or heavily discounted entrance fees for all mothers on Mother’s Day.
Many restaurants offer discounts for mothers dining out or for gift card purchases to use for future visits. Others give complementary small treats for mothers on Mother’s Day itself. One sure sign of pandemic recovery will be a run on restaurants as many families will seek to give mom a day off from cooking by having someone else do it at a restaurant. If money is tight, the internet has plenty of suggestions of how to show appreciation for mothers without spending anything at all.
Despite the commercialization of this holiday, some of the best tributes however are a sincere understanding of what mothers sacrifice for their children. Mothers often changed the course of history just through their choices although history might not acknowledge it until years later.
One set of actions that changed the course of history was thirty-three year old Mamie Till-Mobley‘s choice to hold an open casket funeral for her lynched son Emmett Till in 1955. This one choice changed the course of the Civil Rights movement by exposing the horrific actions committed against a barely 14 year old child. Till was killed on August 28, 1955, one month after his 14th birthday, less than four months after Mother’s Day; his funeral was held in September.
Mamie Till at Emmett Till’s funeral [Smithsonian Archives]
Mamie Till’s choice to expose the horrors inflicted upon her son’s body as the result of a lynching, not only changed the course of the Civil Rights movement; however, it raised the issue of threats against a very democracy that champions equal justice and its administration through the jury system.
Historically, lynching is mob justice: a group is judge and jury with a conventional trial not considered necessary. The United States prides itself as a country with liberty and justice for all; however, there is reality that simmers beneath the veneer of normality – until it boils over. Although the original laws passed during the Civil Rights Movement included addressing and securing rights for people of color, at the time namely African Americans, they did not address the horrific and all too common act of lynching.
Lynching is one of the those points of contention as it is a controversial subject, primarily due to its raw, visceral, and visual impression upon the viewer. Billie Holliday‘s 1939 recording of the song “Strange Fruit” is based on the composer’s recollection of a specific image of Black bodies hanging from trees.
Used as a means of intimidation and threats against many people of color, mostly African Americans, lynching was not merely an idea, but a serious possibility and reality for those visiting or living in the southern United States. Victor Hugo Green’s valuable work, The Negro Motorist Green-Book, helped to discern safe places to stay or where not to travel in the Southern United States the three decades of 1936-1966. The chilling underlying possibility of lynching had an effect on many Black families: children and grandchildren were warned to stay close to family and to be careful when traveling down South.
In A Good Time for the Truth: Race in Minnesota (2016), Taiyon Coleman’s essay “Disparate Impacts: Moving to Minnesota to Live Just Enough for the City” describes a part of her 1998 trip from Chicago to Tuscaloosa, Alabama that would help her to decide between attending graduate school at the University of Minnesota or the University of Alabama. Over 40 years past the murder of Emmett Till and Black families still feared for their children and grandchildren the way Mamie Till, who raised her son in Chicago, feared for her son when he spent time in Mississippi in the summer of 1955.
“My grandparents were more afraid of the historical, ongoing, and de facto legacy of Jim Crow physical violence. They extracted yet another promise from me to not stop my car for gas or a bag of spicy pig skins, or to take a bathroom break at all in that part of Missouri until I (directly inside my car) passed the state line into Arkansas, all before dark, and I set off. “
The common refrain of “don’t drive through the South” remains to this day for many people of color, for fear of death at the hands of others being the outcome. A 2021 Washington Post article reminds Americans how lynchings still occur in Mississippi.
National Memorial for Peace and Justice [Wikimedia Commons, CC 4.0]
The first saving grace from the reminders over decades regarding the impact of lynching are the 2018 opening of the National Memorial for Peace and Justice, known as the National Lynching Memorial in Alabama. The hanging panels hold space to honor the past in truth.
The second is the Emmett Till Antilynching Act, signed into law at the end of March. It took over 100 years since the first bill attempting to make lynching a federal crime was introduced in 1918. While the bill, introduced in the 65th Congress by Republican Missouri Congressman Leonidas Dyer, did not pass, it paved the way for more bills to be introduced during the course of the 20th and 21st centuries to make the horror that Emmett Till and countless others suffered crime punishable by federal law.
One of the greatest gifts of motherhood is the ability to cherish the lives of the children we raise and the families we love. We all have someone, living or dead, who has taken the time to nurture, guide, and comfort us from the time we arrive into this world until we have long past traditional markers of adulthood.
As is often noted, there is no “handbook” on how to be a good parent. For those who take on the role of mother, regardless of gender identification, the choice made to steer the young placed into their care is rewarded years or even decades later. The choices we make on behalf of our children are guideposts in service of a larger truth.
Flower [Pixabay]
Mamie Till’s reward for her bravery in 1955 by choosing to reveal the horrors ravaged upon her son by using an open casket was two fold: the national memorial acknowledging the stain that lynching bears upon the country and in the act that bears her son’s name.
Mamie Till-Mobley’s choice as a mother has stood the test of time. She sacrificed for her child and for the many children who came after her child. We honor that kind of bravery and decision making each and every day, but especially on Mother’s Day. Mothers are the first line of protection and warmth for so many. They deserve every honor and acknowledgement we can give.
Happy Mother’s Day!
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Dear Clio, thank you for this article.
Thanks, so important to remember the fierce strength of mothers, a force of nature indeed. Mamie Till-Mobley is a hero and a role model.