My uncle and grandmother were both living in Kent at the time, just two blocks from the campus, so I heard first-hand stories about the National Guard jeeps and helicopters roaring around all night with searchlights on.

 

Ten years later, I was a grad student at Kent State, and I got my first Archives job as a student in the KSU Archives.  I've seen the extensive documentation of "May 4" that exists in the Archives.  As to why it happened at Kent State, there are many who believe that the situation never would have escalated had not the Ohio governor sent in the National Guard to confront those protesting Nixon's incursion into Cambodia.  Both the on-scene Highway Patrol commander and Sheriff argued that they had the situation in hand and didn't the Guard.  But the governor was determined to "teach those kids a lesson" so he sent in Guard units that had slept very little in the preceding week because they had been convoying trucks during a Teamsters strike.  Add to that the fact that they had no training in crowd or riot control.  All they knew was how to load and fire an M1 rifle or a 45 automatic.  We'll never know if the local aut! horities really would have kept the situation in hand, but when the Guard arrived, they took control and the local cops became bystanders.  All shooting (four dead and nine wounded) was done by the Guard.  And, contrary to a rumor that still makes the rounds, all thirteen people shot were enrolled students, not "outside agitators," as has been reported.  One of the four killed was in ROTC and was walking to class, at the far edge of the confrontation.

 

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James Stimpert
Archivist (Arts and Sciences)        E-mail:    [log in to unmask]
MSE Library
Johns Hopkins University             Voice:     (410) 516-8323
3400 North Charles Street
Baltimore, MD  21218                  Fax:       (410) 516-7202


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