Kent State, May 4, 1970: When America Killed It's Children

Allison Krause, William Schroeder, Jeffrey Miller, Sandra Scheuer

The bombing of Cambodia was a squalid secret. It's architect was a Jewish emigre, Nixons's National Security advisor, Nobel Peace Prize Winner Henry Kissinger who, Christopher Hitchens, in his The Trial of Henry Kissinger, says is a war criminal... and not just for carpet bombing the Cambodians.

When knowledge of the bombing of Cambodia which had been secretly going on for months, if not years, became public it resulted in student protests in many places in the US. AS a result of riots which involved an attempt to burn down the Kent University State (Ohio) ROTC Building Governor James Rhodes sent in the National Guard.

On the 4th of May the Guard marched down a hill, they had removed identity tags and were unidentifiable wearing gas masks, to a field of angry, shouting, casually dressed young protestors and then back up again. As the group of guradsmen reached the buildings of the University the Guardsmen wheeled and fired into the students killing four and injuring another nine.13 seconds of indiscriminate gunfire (One Mississippi ... two Mississippi...) 67 shots in total 5 per second.

Not known for many years there was there was also an undercover FBI informant, Terry Norman, carrying a gun on the field that day.

The Guardsmen were told the same night that they would never be prosecuted by the state of Ohio. They never were.

The Nixon administration stalled for years, "investigations" were announced and dried up, Nixons notorious White House tapes subsequently released show that Nixon thought demonstrators were bums, and asked the Secret Service to go beat them up, and apparently felt that the Kent State victims had it coming.

As did most of the country; William Gordon graduate of Kent in 1973 and of author of Four Dead in Ohio, called the killings "the most popular murders ever committed in the United States."

President Nixon created a public atmosphere in which students who opposed the war were fair game for those who supported the government. Construction workers rioted on Wall Street a week later attacking antiwar demonstrators and sending many to the hospital.

President Nixon called the parents of one student who was killed and was a bystander--he was a member of ROTC-- and he expressed his condolences.

Ignoring pleas from the families of the victims and current KSU students who set up a makeshift Tent City on the practice football field, Kent State proceeded to build gymnasium annex over a large part of the site of the May 4 confrontation. 192 protesters were removed from the site and arrested. Subsequent protests are similarly unsuccessful.

in May 1990 KSU dedicated, eventually a memorial of granite slabs in a woodland setting, to "the events of May 4" (not the victims). At the dedication ceremonies, Ohio Governor Richard Celeste apologized to the families of the four slain students and the nine surviving victims.

Pic Mary Ann Vecchio over the body of Jeffrey Miller shot in the mouth - a picture that went round the world -

At 9:45 a.m. the Victory Bell will be rung 32 times in honor of those killed at Virginia Tech.

"Truth: The First Casualty of War," the 37th Annual Kent State May 4 Commemoration, will be held in the Commons beginning at noon. Cindy Sheehan, mother of Casey Sheehan, a soldier killed in Iraq, will be the keynote speaker.

Other speakers include: Tom Hayden, founding member of the Students for a Democratic Society; Rosemary Palmer, mother of Lance Corporal Edward "Augie" Schroeder, KIA in Iraq; Gene Young, witness to Jackson State shootings, May 14, 1970; Joe Lewis, Jr., wounded at Kent State, May 4, 1970; Jim Russell, wounded at Kent State, May 4, 1970; Tim Ryan, U.S. Representative for the 17th District of Ohio; Mary Ann Vecchio, woman from the Pulitzer Prize winning photograph shown above; Jim Mueller, former May 4 Task Force Co-chair; Isaac Miller, Kent State Anti-War Committee; Kellie Cornachiore, Alpha Xi Delta.

Alan Canfora, who was shot in the right wrist, that day has an audio recording of the shootings 37 years ago at Kent State University which includes the voices of Ohio National Guard leaders ordering troops to fire into a crowd of students.

When played for the press (NYT report) on May 1st it was possible to faintly hear someone shout “Point!” Through grainy static and the high-pitched calls of protesters. Mr. Canfora said the full command is recorded on the tape, with multiple voices shouting “Right here!” “Get Set!” Point!” and “Fire!” Those words, however, were difficult to discern when he played the recording. A 13-second volley of gunfire follows, during which four students were killed and nine were wounded.

The audiotape of the shooting was recorded on a reel-to-reel machine by Terry Strubbe, a Kent State student whose dorm room overlooked the demonstrations, said Joe Bendo, Mr. Strubbe’s friend and spokesman.

The copy obtained by Mr. Canfora came from the Yale University Library, which received it in 1989 as part of a large donation of materials from David E. Engdahl, a lawyer who represented the shooting victims in a civil lawsuit in the late 1970s. Mr. Canfora discovered the tape in the Yale archives a few months ago, he said, while researching a book.

“It was very precise. They all turned in unison,” said Jerry M. Lewis, professor emeritus of sociology, who witnessed the shooting, wrote a book and taught a class on the events. “That’s why we’ve argued for years that there was an order or a signal to fire.”


At 5:30 p.m. May 4th in the Resource Room, located on the first floor of the University Library, students will have the opportunity to meet some of those wounded in the attack, such as Alan Canfora, Tom Grace and Joe Lewis.

A candlelight drum circle will take place at the May 4 Memorial at 10 p.m., and at 11 p.m., participants will gather at the Victory Bell candlelight march.

Full detail of all events arranged over 2 days here in Cleveland Plain Dealer