The Rev. Wheeler Parker Jr. lives just outside Justice.
This has been true his whole life. In the geographic sense, he has lived in Summit, Illinois (or the subdivision of Argo, annexed long ago into Summit), for most of his 83 years. Summit ambles alongside the Des Plaines River, a bit north of the village of Justice. In a more poetic sense, though, Parker has also lived outside justice since 1955, when he visited Mississippi with his cousin Emmett Till. He is the last witness to the encounter that sealed Till’s fate and the last living witness to Till’s abduction four nights later.
Other than Carolyn Bryant, whose accusation unleashed the full wrath of Jim Crow.
