A Note From the Descendant

Why this archive exists

I grew up knowing that Emmett Till and Mamie Till-Mobley were part of my family story. But the deeper I researched our genealogy, the more I realized that the public story often begins in 1955.

Our family did not.

BEFORE TILL is my effort to recover the generations who came before—to document their names, relationships, lives, struggles, faith, land, migrations, and the evidence they left behind.

This archive distinguishes what we can prove, what our family remembers, and what we are still trying to discover.

What I am investigating

The open questions currently carried in the Mystery Lab: the school remembered as "Vicksburg College," the reported separation of Hilliard and Bettie, the reported connection to Bishop C. H. Mason, and the parentage of Hilliard and Bettie.