Wright Thompson

And, like, the thing that really shakes me is, I mean, the Mississippi Delta wasn't urban, but there were people everywhere.

Because you used to have a family every 25 acres.

So, you know, if you were farming 10,000 acres, it's 400 families.

And so, you know, which is a couple of, you know, 1,200 to 1,500 people.

And now you can farm that land with 18 people everywhere.

And that's just because the tractors can't turn themselves around.

I mean, we're 10 years away from farming that with four people.

So Willie Reed shows back up at this barn, or Willie Lewis, that was his new name.

He shows up at this barn, and the house where he grew up is gone.

The house where his brother lived is gone.

Every single piece of evidence that he or anyone he ever knew in the first 18 years of his life had ever existed at all had been completely wiped clean, except that barn was still there.

And the FBI agent said it really like, like he lost his balance almost, like just the cosmic weight of it.

And like, it's not ancient history, man.

You know, when I started doing this, there were probably 12 people left alive who knew him until, and now there are probably eight.

I mean, they're dying in front of me, but there are people who really knew him.

Wheeler Parker, who's a Church of God in Christ minister in suburban Chicago, was Emmett Till's cousin.

He was his best friend and next door neighbor.

He rode the train south with him in 55, rode the train home alone.

The kidnappers pointed the gun in his face first.

He's the last living eyewitness to the kidnapping.