Beyond the direct effects of the May 4, the shootings have certainly come to symbolize the deep political and social divisions that so sharply divided the country during the Vietnam War era. In the nearly three decades since May 4, l, a voluminous literature has developed analyzing the events of May 4 and their aftermath.
Some books were published quickly, providing a fresh but frequently superficial or inaccurate analysis of the shootings e. Numerous additional books have been published in subsequent years e. These books have the advantage of a broader historical perspective than the earlier books, but no single book can be considered the definitive account of the events and aftermath of May 4, l, at Kent State University.
Despite the substantial literature which exists on the Kent State shootings, misinformation and misunderstanding continue to surround the events of May 4.
Soon afterward, with no provocation, soldiers opened fire into a group of fleeing students. Four young people were killed, shot in the back, including two women who had been walking to class. This article is an attempt to deal with the historical inaccuracies that surround the May 4 shootings at Kent State University by providing high school social studies teachers with a resource to which they can turn if they wish to teach about the subject or to involve students in research on the issue.
Our approach is to raise and provide answers to twelve of the most frequently asked questions about May 4 at Kent State. We will also offer a list of the most important questions involving the shootings which have not yet been answered satisfactorily. Finally, we will conclude with a brief annotated bibliography for those wishing to explore the subject further. The decision to bring the Ohio National Guard onto the Kent State University campus was directly related to decisions regarding American involvement in the Vietnam War.
Richard Nixon was elected president of the United States in based in part on his promise to bring an end to the war in Vietnam. During the first year of Nixon's presidency, America's involvement in the war appeared to be winding down.
This decision was announced on national television and radio on April 30, l, by President Nixon, who stated that the invasion of Cambodia was designed to attack the headquarters of the Viet Cong, which had been using Cambodian territory as a sanctuary. Protests occurred the next day, Friday, May 1, across United States college campuses where anti-war sentiment ran high.
At Kent State University, an anti-war rally was held at noon on the Commons, a large, grassy area in the middle of campus which had traditionally been the site for various types of rallies and demonstrations.
Fiery speeches against the war and the Nixon administration were given, a copy of the Constitution was buried to symbolize the murder of the Constitution because Congress had never declared war, and another rally was called for noon on Monday, May 4. Friday evening in downtown Kent began peacefully with the usual socializing in the bars, but events quickly escalated into a violent confrontation between protestors and local police. The exact causes of the disturbance are still the subject of debate, but bonfires were built in the streets of downtown Kent, cars were stopped, police cars were hit with bottles, and some store windows were broken.
The entire Kent police force was called to duty as well as officers from the county and surrounding communities. Kent Mayor Leroy Satrom declared a state of emergency, called Governor James Rhodes' office to seek assistance, and ordered all of the bars closed. The decision to close the bars early increased the size of the angry crowd.
Police eventually succeeded in using tear gas to disperse the crowd from downtown, forcing them to move several blocks back to the campus. The next day, Saturday, May 2, Mayor Satrom met with other city officials and a representative of the Ohio National Guard who had been dispatched to Kent.
The mayor feared further disturbances in Kent based upon the events of the previous evening, but more disturbing to the mayor were threats that had been made to downtown businesses and city officials as well as rumors that radical revolutionaries were in Kent to destroy the city and the university. Satrom was fearful that local forces would be inadequate to meet the potential disturbances, and thus about 5 p.
Members of the Ohio National Guard were already on duty in Northeast Ohio, and thus they were able to be mobilized quickly to move to Kent. As the Guard arrived in Kent at about 10 p. The wooden ROTC building adjacent to the Commons was ablaze and would eventually burn to the ground that evening, with well over 1, demonstrators surrounding the building.
Controversy continues to exist regarding who was responsible for setting fire to the ROTC building, but radical protestors were assumed to be responsible because of their actions in interfering with the efforts of firemen to extinguish the fire as well as cheering the burning of the building.
Confrontations between Guardsmen and demonstrators continued into the night, with tear gas filling the campus and numerous arrests being made.
Sunday, May 3 was a day filled with contrasts. Nearly 1, Ohio National Guardsmen occupied the campus, making it appear like a military war zone. The day was warm and sunny, however, and students frequently talked amicably with Guardsmen. At a press conference, he issued a provocative statement calling campus protestors the worst type of people in America and stating that every force of law would be used to deal with them.
Rhodes also indicated that he would seek a court order declaring a state of emergency. This was never done, but the widespread assumption among both Guard and University officials was that a state of martial law was being declared in which control of the campus resided with the Guard rather than University leaders and all rallies were banned.
Further confrontations between protesters and guardsmen occurred Sunday evening, and once again rocks, tear gas, and arrests characterized a tense campus. At the conclusion of the anti-war rally on Friday, May 1, student protest leaders had called for another rally to be held on the Commons at noon on Monday, May 4. Although University officials had attempted on the morning of May 4 to inform the campus that the rally was prohibited, a crowd began to gather beginning as early as 11 a.
By noon, the entire Commons area contained approximately 3, people. Although estimates are inexact, probably about core demonstrators were gathered around the Victory Bell at one end of the Commons, another 1, people were "cheerleaders" supporting the active demonstrators, and an additional 1, people were spectators standing around the perimeter of the Commons.
Substantial consensus exists that the active participants in the rally were primarily protesting the presence of the Guard on campus, although a strong anti-war sentiment was also present. Little evidence exists as to who were the leaders of the rally and what activities were planned, but initially the rally was peaceful. Conflicting evidence exists regarding who was responsible for the decision to ban the noon rally of May 4. At the federal civil trial, General Robert Canterbury, the highest official of the Guard, testified that widespread consensus existed that the rally should be prohibited because of the tensions that existed and the possibility that violence would again occur.
Canterbury further testified that Kent State President Robert White had explicitly told Canterbury that any demonstration would be highly dangerous. In contrast, White testified that he could recall no conversation with Canterbury regarding banning the rally.
The decision to ban the rally can most accurately be traced to Governor Rhodes' statements on Sunday, May 3 when he stated that he would be seeking a state of emergency declaration from the courts.
Although he never did this, all officials -- Guard, University, Kent -- assumed that the Guard was now in charge of the campus and that all rallies were illegal. Thus, University leaders printed and distributed on Monday morning 12, leaflets indicating that all rallies, including the May 4 rally scheduled for noon, were prohibited as long as the Guard was in control of the campus.
Shortly before noon, General Canterbury made the decision to order the demonstrators to disperse. A Kent State police officer standing by the Guard made an announcement using a bullhorn.
When this had no effect, the officer was placed in a jeep along with several Guardsmen and driven across the Commons to tell the protestors that the rally was banned and that they must disperse.
This was met with angry shouting and rocks, and the jeep retreated. Canterbury then ordered his men to load and lock their weapons, tear gas canisters were fired into the crowd around the Victory Bell, and the Guard began to march across the Commons to disperse the rally.
The protestors moved up a steep hill, known as Blanket Hill, and then down the other side of the hill onto the Prentice Hall parking lot as well as an adjoining practice football field. Most of the Guardsmen followed the students directly and soon found themselves somewhat trapped on the practice football field because it was surrounded by a fence. Yelling and rock throwing reached a peak as the Guard remained on the field for about 10 minutes. Several Guardsmen could be seen huddling together, and some Guardsmen knelt and pointed their guns, but no weapons were shot at this time.
That Friday night, protestors broke windows and threw bottles at police cars. The next day, the ROTC building on campus was set ablaze; arson was suspected, but nobody was ever apprehended.
Local officials asked that the university close down, but Ohio Governor James Rhodes—who himself was running in a contested Republican primary for U. Senate—called in the National Guard. A noon rally was set for Monday, May 4. National Guard troops fired tear gas at the crowd, which included some people throwing rocks at the soldiers, and appeared to be falling back before several Guardsmen, explained at the time as a moment of panic and fear for their lives, fired a total of 67 shots from M-1 rifles at the students—some protesting the expansion of the Vietnam War into Cambodia and some just on their way to class.
This should remind us all once again that when dissent turns to violence, it invites tragedy. Three days after the shootings, a general student strike occurred across the country, with nearly 4 million people walking out of class. On May 14, at Jackson State College now University in Mississippi, National Guard troops and local law enforcement fired more than shots into a dormitory—responding, they said, to sniper fire. No evidence of sniper fire was ever found.
Phillip Gibbs, a student at Jackson State, and James Green, a high school student, were killed in the barrage. They were also concerned that SDS did not understand that assaulting police officers invited a wholesale beating of everyone, including BUS members.
In the spring of , Jim Mellen, who had decamped from the University of Michigan, stood on top of an overturned trash can and laid out the SDS worldview:. I know that there are some pigs out there who still think we should occupy Vietnam. And there are some pigs out there who still think they can go into ghettoes and push people around.
We are no longer asking you to come and help us make a revolution. White was especially angered by his own liberal arts professors, who had helped SDS members occupying a campus building to evade arrest. He himself had stood by at first and then surrounded the building with Ohio Highway Patrol troopers to prevent the activists from escaping. Thanks to faculty assistance, however, the SDSers were able to flee through an exit the Highway Patrol had overlooked.
After the spring events at Kent State, the campus appeared to have settled down. There were rumors of Weathermen comings and goings, but no reported incidents of violence. The Weathermen had attempted to kill a Cleveland police officer with a car bomb but failed. This action escalated the war he had promised to end, which upset the anti-war students.
College students, who had believed they were safe from the draft if their lottery number was high enough, now feared an escalation of combat. Campus demonstrations erupted nationally, some peaceful, others violent. The next day, May 1, a bar fight among students moved into the streets. Soon, rioters were breaking store windows. While the fire raged, the Ohio Guard arrived. A map detailing the movements of the National Guard at Kent State and the location of the four students when they were killed.
Many of the Ohio Guard troops were regular Army veterans with little patience for student protesters. Some had been patrolling the highways hunting Teamster snipers who had been shooting at nonunion truckers.
Looking at the angry and jittery troops, nearly all the black students fled, fearful they would be shot. Some of the working-class white student activists shared that concern but remained. Most middle-class students argued that the troops did not have loaded guns.
On May 4, after facing the jeers of 2, protestors and being on the receiving end of thrown rocks, a few Guardsmen opened fire. Thirteen students were hit, four fatally. Across the nation four million students participated in protest activities after the Kent State shootings. Shaken by the wave of protests, Nixon withdrew U. The group was active in the s, including in the events leading up to May 4, and fell apart in the next decade but reformed in recent years. As the 50th anniversary of May 4 approached, Kent State students continued to find ways to make their voices heard on campus.
Earlier this year, several student organizations, including BUS and SDS, sent a list of demands to the university administration. The demands in the eight-page letter included returning the planning of the May 4 remembrance to the students and a call to increase mental health services. Student leaders had a few meetings with officials from the administration before the coronavirus pandemic hit the area.
Still, Hylton said the legacy of May 4 and its impact on student activism remain entrenched in Kent State. Contact Beacon Journal reporters Jennifer Pignolet at jpignolet thebeaconjournal.
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