On August 28, 1955, in the wee hours of the night in backwoods Mississippi, Emmett Till, a Black 14-year-old boy, was taken from his family and brought to a barn where he was brutally tortured and murdered.

Seven decades later, the barn where Till was brutalized will now become a memorial.

The Emmett Till Interpretive Center announced this week that after years of hurdles and setbacks, the organization can now see this major effort come to life.

Thanks to a generous donation of $1.5 million from TV mogul Shonda Rhimes, the organization was able to purchase the barn, which is located just outside of Drew, Miss. According to CNN, the property was purchased this Nov. 18.

ETIC Executive Director Patrick Weems told Mississippi Today that buying the barn is only the start for the nonprofit. “Now we’re working to raise the resources to transform it into a sacred site.” 

The disturbing and heartbreaking story of Emmett Till is now known far and wide, thanks to his mother, Mamie Till-Mobley’s advocacy, devotion, and fearlessness. His death was the rallying point of the Civil Rights movement: the Montgomery Bus boycott began 100 days later. 

Reverend Jesse Jackson told Vanity Fair (1988) that “Rosa [Parks] said she thought about going to the back of the bus. But then she thought about Emmett Till and she couldn’t do it.”

However, unlike Parks, public markers honoring the late 14-year-old’s memory and fate are few and far between.

For decades, the spot where Emmett’s body was said to have been recovered went unrecognized until 2008, when a marker was erected.

Since then, it’s been defaced, stolen, riddled with bullets, thrown into the river, and then...shot up with bullets again.

One of these destroyed signs has even sat on display at the Smithsonian’s National Museum of American History, as a nod to modern forms of anti-blackness and its subsequent violence.

Now, a sign made of steel, weighing 500 pounds, sits at Graball Landing, located across from where the Black Bayou meets the Tallahatchie River.

The barn will be under 24-hour surveillance and equipped with floodlights and security cameras, the Associated Press shares.

“The barn is more than history — it is a reminder of what democracy requires from each of us: honesty, courage, and the willingness to remember together,” Weems said in a statement from the ETIC.

“The barn will open as a part of a larger public memorial — a place of truth, creativity, and conscience. Visitors will come not to look at tragedy, but to confront their own role in the ongoing work of democracy.”

​The memorial is slated to open in 2030, the 75th anniversary of Emmett’s death.