Obit watch: April 28, 2023.

As promised, NYT obit for Jerry Springer.

In 2008, some students objected when Mr. Springer was invited to give the commencement address at Northwestern.
“To the students who invited me — thank you,” he said. “I am honored. To the students who object to my presence — well, you’ve got a point. I, too, would’ve chosen someone else.”

Massad Ayoob has posted an obit for Bart Skelton on his blog. This is the only source I’ve found that I can link.

Carolyn Bryant Donham.

She was working in her husband’s general store on Aug. 24, 1955. She was white, married, and 21 years old. Her husband was a trucker who was working that day.

A group of black teenagers came to the store. Mrs. Bryant (at the time) claimed that one of the teenagers, a 14-year old boy, “made a sexually suggestive remark to her, grabbed her roughly by the waist and let loose a wolf whistle.”

That boy was Emmett Till.

He was killed four days later. Mr. Bryant and his half-brother were charged with the murder, but were acquitted.

The murder of Emmett Till was a watershed in United States race relations. Coverage of the killing and its aftermath, including a widely disseminated photograph of Till’s brutalized body at his open-casket funeral, inspired anguish and outrage, helped propel the modern civil rights movement and ultimately contributed to the demise of Jim Crow.

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