May 4, 1970
OHIO by Crosby, Stills, Nash and Young
Tin soldiers and Nixon's comin'.
We're finally on our own.
This summer I hear the drummin‘
Four dead in Ohio.
Gotta get down to it.
Soldiers are gunning us down.
Should have been done long ago.
What if you knew her and
Found her dead on the ground?
How can you run when you know?
Tin soldiers and Nixon's comin'.
We're finally on our own.
This summer I hear the drummin'.
Four dead in Ohio.
Kent's Mayor Leroy Satrom declared a state of
emergency on May 2 and asked Ohio Governor
James A. Rhodes to send the National Guard to
Kent to help maintain order.
When the National Guard arrived in town that
evening (at around 10 P.M.), a large
demonstration was already under way on the
campus, and the campus Reserve Officer Training
Corps (ROTC) building (which had already been
scheduled for demolition) was burning. The
arsonists were never apprehended and no one
was injured in the fire. More than a thousand
protesters surrounded the building and cheered
its burning. Several Kent firemen and police
officers were struck by rocks and other objects
while attempting to extinguish the blaze. Several
fire engine companies had to be called in because
protesters carried the fire hose into the Commons
and slashed it. The National Guard made
numerous arrests and used tear gas; at least one
student was slightly wounded with a bayonet.
During a press conference, Governor Rhodes called the
protesters un-American and referred to the protesters
as revolutionaries set on destroying higher education
in Ohio. "They're worse than the brown shirts and the
communist element and also the night riders and the
vigilantes," Rhodes said. "They're the worst type of
people that we harbor in America. I think that we're
up against the strongest, well-trained, militant,
revolutionary group that has ever assembled in
America."
Rhodes also claimed he would obtain a court order
declaring a state of emergency, banning further
demonstrations, and gave the impression that a
situation akin to martial law had been declared;
however he never attempted to obtain such an order.


During the day some students came into downtown
Kent to help with cleanup efforts after the rioting,
which met with mixed reactions from local
businessmen. Mayor Satrom, under pressure from
frightened citizens, ordered a curfew until further
notice.
Around 8:00 p.m., another rally was held on the
campus Commons. By 8:45 p.m. the Guardsmen used
tear gas to disperse the crowd, and the students
reassembled at the intersection of Lincoln and Main
Streets, holding a sit-in in the hopes of gaining a
meeting with Mayor Satrom and President White. At
11:00 p.m., the Guard announced that a curfew had
gone into effect and began forcing the students back
to their dorms. A few students were bayoneted by
Guardsmen.
Monday, May 4th, 1970

On Monday, May 4, a protest was scheduled
to be held at noon, as had been planned
three days earlier. University officials
attempted to ban the gathering, handing out
12,000 leaflets stating that the event was
canceled. Despite this, an estimated 2,000
people gathered[17] on the university's
Commons, near Taylor Hall. The protest
began with the ringing of the campus's iron
Victory Bell (which had historically been used
to signal victories in football games) to mark
the beginning of the rally, and the first
protester began to speak.

Fearing that the situation might escalate into
another violent protest, Companies A and C,
1/145th Infantry and Troop G of the 2/107th
Armored Cavalry, Ohio Army National Guard
(ARNG), the units on the campus grounds,
attempted to disperse the students. The
legality of the dispersal was later debated at a
subsequent wrongful death and injury trial.
On appeal, the United States Court of
Appeals for the Sixth Circuit ruled that
authorities did indeed have the right to
disperse the crowd.
May 4th

The dispersal process began late
in the morning with campus
patrolman Harold Rice, riding in a
National Guard Jeep, approaching
the students to read them an order
to disperse or face arrest. The
protesters responded by throwing
rocks, forcing the Jeep to retreat.

Just before noon, the Guard
returned and again ordered the
crowd to disperse. When most of
the crowd refused, the Guard used
tear gas. Because of wind, the tear
gas had little effect in dispersing
the crowd, and some launched a
second volley of rocks toward the
Guard's line, too distant to have
any effect, to chants of "Pigs off
campus!" The students lobbed the
tear gas canisters back at the
National Guardsmen, who wore
gas masks.
May 4th

When it was obvious the crowd was not
going to disperse, a group of 77 National
Guard troops from A Company and Troop
G, with bayonets fixed on their weapons,
began to advance upon the hundreds of
protesters. As the guardsmen advanced,
the protesters retreated up and over
Blanket Hill, heading out of The Commons
area. Once over the hill, the students, in a
loose group, moved northeast along the
front of Taylor Hall, with some continuing
toward a parking lot in front of Prentice Hall
(slightly northeast of and perpendicular to
Taylor Hall). The guardsmen pursued the
protesters over the hill, but rather than
veering left as the protesters had, they
continued straight, heading down toward
an athletic practice field enclosed by a
chain link fence. Here they remained for
about ten minutes, unsure of how to get
out of the area short of retracing their
entrance path (an action some guardsmen
considered might be viewed as a retreat).
During this time, the bulk of the students
congregated off to the left and front of the
guardsmen, approximately 150 ft (50m) to
225 ft (75m) away, on the veranda of
Taylor Hall. Others were scattered between
Taylor Hall and the Prentice Hall parking
lot, while still others, perhaps 35 or 40,
were standing in the parking lot, or
dispersing through the lot as they had been
previously ordered.
May 4th

While on the practice field, the guardsmen generally faced
the parking lot which was about 100 yards away. At one
point, some of the guardsmen knelt and aimed their
weapons toward the parking lot, then stood up again. For a
few moments, several guardsmen formed a loose huddle
and appeared to be talking to one another. The guardsmen
appeared to be unclear as to what to do next. They had
cleared the protesters from the Commons area, and many
students had left, but many stayed and were still angrily
confronting the soldiers, some throwing rocks and tear gas
canisters. At the end of about ten minutes, the guardsmen
began to retrace their steps back up the hill toward the
Commons area. Some of the students on the Taylor Hall
veranda began to move slowly toward the soldiers as the
latter passed over the top of the hill and headed back down
into the Commons.
12:24 pm – May 4th, 1970

At this point, at 12:24 PM, a number
of guardsmen at the top of the hill
abruptly turned and fired their M1
Garand rifles at the students. The
guardsmen directed their fire not at
the closest students, who were on
the Taylor Hall veranda, but at those
on the grass area and concrete
walkway below the veranda, at those
on the service road between the
veranda and the parking lot, and at
those in the parking lot. Bullets were
not sprayed in all directions; instead,
they were confined to a fairly limited
line of fire leading from the top of the
hill to the parking lot. Not all the
soldiers who fired their weapons
directed their fire into the students.
Some soldiers fired into the ground,
while a few fired into the air. In all, 29
of the 77 guardsmen claimed to have
fired their weapons, using a final total
of 67 bullets. The shooting was
determined to have lasted only 13
seconds, although a New York Times
reporter stated that "it appeared to
go on, as a solid volley, for perhaps a
full minute or a little longer." The
question of why the shots were fired
remains widely debated.
FOUR
DEAD
IN
OHIO
All 4 students
killed by the Ohio
National Guard
were not involved
in the protest.
Where it happened
Reaction to the Massacre
Kent State Survivor Story
Memorials
The above memorial is from the
Minnesota State University –
Mankato Campus in Mankato, MN
between Morris Hall and
Armstong Hall