I wrote this article in high school, but I am formally applying for copyright in the Library of Congress. It would be foolish of you to copy this to a paper of your own.

"Three weeks ago in Kent, three to five dozen bullets killed four young persons, wounded nine, and plunged the nation into the most divisive controversy so far in this decade," said the Akron Beacon Journal on Sunday, May 24, 1970. This event spun off a song by Crosby, Stills, and Young entitled "Ohio."

In 1970, a significant number of people were questioning U.S. involvement in Vietnam. On Friday, May 1, as students on the campus of Kent State University in Kent, Ohio sat down to breakfast, they noticed something on the front of their morning paper that didn't agree with them. "Unh, unh! Trouble," said Tim Butz of Arkon, then twenty-two and a former draftee in the Air Force (Michener, 1971:13). What caught his eye was news that President Nixon had ordered troops into Cambodia.

It did not take long to get a response from the students at Kent State. At 7:50, agitators painted the pavements with spray cans: Free Bobby. Free Huey. U.S. Out of Cambodia (Michener, 1971:13). Some students spent the night between midnight and dawn painting such signs all over town. By 10:00 AM that day, students started passing flyers around school announcing a noon rally in the commons to bury the Constitution. Sure enough, the huge bell in the middle of campus started ringing at 11:45, the rally was held, and some students went even as far as to burn their discharge papers. Opposition to the rally was light and it completed with little protest.

By 3:00 that same day, students stretched out on the grass for another rally. This time they cam to listen to the grievances of the blacks on campus. To the surprise of some, the rally had little, if nothing, to do with Kent State but with Ohio Sate University, where for the past week serious riots had disrupted the campus. Three visitors listed eighteen demands of the blacks, and one, who gave his name only as Brown, explained that the whites joined the demonstration with a nineteenth, "ROTC must go." The statement created just such a result.

As any normal Friday night went in Kent, the students, for the most part, flooded to Water Street for happy hour. Particularly on North Water Street, were the bars frequented by university students. Pirate's Alley for people with money, Big Daddy's with their pizza, and J.B.'s with their music were all part of the Friday and Saturday night excitement in town. The night of May 1, things were slightly different. The students moved easily between bars where eighteen year olds could legally drink watered down beer. The size of the crowd grew larger than normal as a good many students came from other universities. By 10:00 excitement increased because scores from the Los Angeles Lakers - New York Knicks game were coming in over the TVs in the bars. It was only accelerated later by a prankster throwing strings of fireworks in the air. Many students mistook the fireworks as gunshots. At 10:30 out of town troublemakers began painting signs with spray cans. The situation only accelerated throughout the night as the students from near and far, mostly high schoolers or members of street gangs, broke storefront windows and car windows. According to the bartender at Big Daddy's, they were more interested in vandalism than protesting Cambodia.

The following morning the white ROTC building on the campus of Kent State University was burned. It took over an hour for the students to get the building blazing, and even though the fire department was ready for such an occasion, no one bothered to turn in a fire alarm. When the fire department finally arrived, students poked holes in the hoses and stole the nozzle, until finally a student with a machete hacked it into pieces. As a result over 60 people were banned from campus. That morning Mayor Satrom came to work angry and disturbed about the destruction to Kent in downtown Kent. After he evaluated the damage done to the city and considered how the city police, campus police, sheriff’s deputies, and highway patrol were enough to make a significant effect on the crowd, he called the National Guard.

The arrival of the National Guard forced students to return to campus. Tear gas was distributed and used freely in an effort to get students to return to their dormitories. During this time, some guardsmen claimed to be injured by students throwing rocks and broken glass, but students testify that the only rock throwing was at the ROTC building before it was ablaze.

Sunday began the day of a carnival, as students called it. People were having fun and families were even bringing picnics. This is also the day when one of the most famous photographs in history was taken, the flower in the gun. Students swore up and down that they thought the guns the Guard had brought on campus were not loaded. As night drew closer, the events on campus made a turn for the worse. Students slowly started to become restless. A small protest was going on downtown against the 8:00 city curfew. Meanwhile, 2,000 students gathered silently around the rim of Blanket Hill in the middle of campus. Guardsmen testified that it was too quiet on campus until a chopper overhead hit the rim of Blanket Hill on campus with a search light which triggered movement by the students. The guard was forced to throw powder at the students, followed by tear gas, and eventually had to hit people with rifle butts. As many as seven students were bayoneted.

Monday was the actual day of the event behind the song by Crosby, Stills, Nash, and Young. In the late morning a rally was called in the commons by the bell on campus. Students started calling for action against the Guard but the commanding officers of the Guard decided to march against the students and not long after began launching gas canisters at the growing crowd of students. By noontime it was hot outside and the guardsmen were sweating in their stuffy gas masks. A good distance had built between the students and the Guard because of the gas canisters. Students began hurling rocks and pieces of concrete at the soldiers. A central detachment of soldiers had reached the top of Blanket Hill at this time, but were being pushed back by an oncoming mass of students that only grew bolder with each step.

Some of the guard retreated to the rear to wait for more tear gas, but a few wheeled to their right and stopped. There was a single shot, then a period of silence lasting about two seconds, then a prolonged burst lasting about eight seconds, then another silence, and two final shots. Twenty-eight different guardsmen had fired, some in the air, but some at the crowd. When the volley ended, thirteen bodies were scattered over the grass and the distant parking area. Four were dead; nine were wounded severely.

When evaluating the distance between the students that were shot and the soldiers that did the shooting, it was obvious that they were only trying to get in their cars and drive home after having finished class for the day. The distances of the students killed were 256, 343, 382, and 390 feet from the soliders (Michener, 1971:342).

The song by Crosby, Stills, Nash, and Young is obviously not one of celebration. The lyrics do not go into much detail at all about the actual events that went on, however the 1971 Kent State yearbook provides extensive pictorial detail on the events at Kent State with the National Guard.

Kichener, James A. Kent State. New York: Random House Inc, 1971.

Norman, David. Interview with Kent Norman. What happened at Kent State. 17 March 1999.
Kent was one of the witnesses to the Monday shooting.

Norman, David. Interview with Martha Norman. What happened at Kent State. 16 March 1999.
Martha was present for the weekend activities on campus and provided good information using her yearbook as a resource.