Illinois Public Media News

Peoria and Champaign compete for HS sports tournament; Police officer charged after fatal crash; African-American work honored in museum.

In 1955, after Chicago teenager Emmett Till was lynched and beaten to death on a trip in Mississippi, his mother Mamie made the decision to have the media cover Emmett’s open casket funeral. Many consider that decision a major factor in helping to ignite the civil rights movement. 

Rev. Martin Luther King Jr. is perhaps best known for his “I Have A Dream” speech. As inspirational as it was, many of his lesser-known speeches offer a nuanced and articulate argument against racism worldwide. In the years closer to his assassination, he also took more radical positions regarding inequality and war.

Many of us probably remember a favorite children’s book from when we were younger, the characters in those stories and maybe some of the lessons we learned in those books still stick with us today. Odds are, though, the book you’re thinking of probably didn’t tackle intersectionality. 

On Today's 21st:  We’re honoring the legacy of Rev. Martin Luther King Jr. We have excerpts from a little-known speech he gave here in Illinois, we also hear from a sociologist and children’s book author about a different kind of book for kids that doesn’t shy away from complex themes. And, some descendants of Black civil rights leaders in Chicago want the public to know more about their family members, while also protecting them at the same time.