How Many DUers Actually Remember the Kent State Killings?

[MineralMan]

I'm just curious about who has actual memory of that day. So, here's a poll:

98 votes, 0 passes | Time left: Unlimited
	Yes, I remember it. (Tell us where you were.)
	79 (81%)
	No, I was too young to remember it.
	6 (6%)
	No, I was not even born yet.
	13 (13%)
	No, I wasn't paying any attention.
	0 (0%)
	Kent State? What about Kent State?
	0 (0%)
	Other
	0 (0%)
	0 DU members did not wish to select any of the options provided.
Show usernames Disclaimer: This is an Internet poll

[MineralMan]

1. I was back in college in California at the time,

after spending four years in the USAF after dropping out of college in my sophomore year. I remember thinking that the incident would change how people protested the Vietnam War. Then, I went to a rally on my campus.

[Shrike47]

2. I was in my last year of college in California. The shooting resonated.

[sinkingfeeling]

3. I was in Columbus, Ohio at OSU. My sister had graduated from Kent in 1969.

The National Guard had been on our campus for a couple of weeks because of student protests. There was a confrontation on the Oval the morning of the Kent shootings. The Guard was armed.

[redstatebluegirl]

4. I was 15 and already protesting the war.

My mom would take me to the protests, telling me there were consequences if I was arrested but she supported how passionate I was about my beliefs. She kept taking me even after the Kent State murders.

[Zoonart]

12. I was 16 years old and protesting the war.

My parents were definitely not. They remained Republicans all their lives and it was a huge impediment to our relationship.
Got thrown out of the house for working for Eugene McCarthy.

I was living in North Jersey, shouting distance from the GW bridge. Kent State was a seminal moment.

[Va Lefty]

5. I was in 4th Grade

Remember my Dad watching Cronkite and saying "They're never gonna end this damn war!"

[Yo_Mama_Been_Loggin]

6. I remember

But I was in 7th grade then

[Cattledog]

7. I was in 10th grade.

[mcar]

8. I was 11

I don't recall knowing the details then, just that it happened.

[jojog]

9. Freshman in High School

I was in Middle Tennessee with my best friend who had moved down from Ohio.
Both his parents were graduates of Kent State.

[nocoincidences]

10. I had graduated from University of Illinois at Champaign/Urbana

in 1969. I took a job back in Southern Illinois where I grew up, and was hanging around with SIU students when it happened. I remember the candlelight marches, and the continuing rage about the war and Nixon.

I'm still basically pissed over things that started back then and continue today.

[safeinOhio]

11. I was hitch hiking back to Ann Arbor

from Indiana on that day. A cop picked me up as soon as I got into Ohio. He was not nice to me and then later I found out why later that day.

[MineralMan]

15. I did a lot of hitchhiking in those days, too.

I don't see hitchhikers any more. In the 60s, I traveled to many places in this country on my thumb. I doubt those travels would even be possible today.

[lunatica]

13. I was living in Mexico City at the time

The Mexican government sent their thug riot police to defend the US Embassy against demonstrators.

I think the entire world heard about it. It heralded a very restive era in the anti war demonstrations. Things got really ugly.

[livetohike]

14. Senior year in high school in the suburbs of Pgh. Allison

Krause was from a neighboring town. Lots of local news coverage. It was horrific.

[fleabiscuit]

16. HS freshman. The "Love it or leave it" flag stickers on cars lost all legitimacy.

[yellerpup]

17. In Tulsa

in the field behind Pickle's bar. I couldn't believe students were slaughtered for nothing and that National Guardsmen were doing the killing. I was ready to fight at 21 and did to stop the war and the draft.

[nykym]

18. I was Graduating from High School

In New Rochelle, NY
NRHS

[Trust Buster]

19. I was living 20 minutes away from Kent State and still do.

I was in the fifth grade. That afternoon our teachers unexpectedly ushered us students to the front lawn of our elementary school. I thought that odd because we always assembled in the back of the school in the playground area. It was that day in the spring when the sun is so warm on your face that you realize that winter is officially over. I can still remember how the sun felt on my face that day.

Anyhow, the teachers did their best to explain the Kent State shootings to us in the context of the overall war. But, we were fifth graders and really didn’t understand. I don’t know why the school didn’t leave it up to our parents to discuss the shooting if they deemed it necessary.

In the decades that followed, I have had many friends and family attend Kent State and I have partied many times on campus. One night, after multiple bong hits, we went to the hill that the Ohio Guard shot down upon the students from. As I looked down that night to where the students were relative to the hill, the surreal nature of the situation sunk in.

[Leith]

20. I Was Only 11 Years Old

All I knew was that they were protesting the war peacefully and the NG gunned them down. It was a major seminal moment in a series of seminal moments in that era.

[nightwing1240]

21. Sophomore in High School

A few years later as a Freshman at Kent State, a history professor with a class of 300 plus students was encouraging all of us to be sure to vote so that James Rhodes would NOT be Governor of Ohio again since he had called out the National Guard which led to the shootings. Although I made sure to vote, not many of my classmates did and the next day at class, after Rhodes victory, he reamed everyone that hadn't voted. To say the least, he was pissed!

[MineralMan]

22. People not voting is why we're in the spot we're in right now.

I'm losing confidence that low turnout will ever end, frankly.

If we don't bother, those who do bother will continue to run things. Why is that so hard for people to understand.

[Greybnk48]

23. My sister's niece from Cleveland was a student at Kent State

when the shootings occurred. I was 22 and living in southern New Jersey.

It wasn't as hard to comprehend at that time given the climate. I now can't even fathom National Guardsmen going onto a campus and shooting students, but I could then with Nixon and that crowd.

We were shocked and horrified, but we had just gone through and extremely violent and bloody Civil Rights movement, and this sort of felt like it may be the beginning of round two of the Govt. vs. the People.

Just how me and my crowd felt.

[kwassa]

24. I was 60 miles away in Oberlin, Ohio.

High School, my senior year. The college shut down over this.

My high school girlfriend later went to Kent State, I visited her there, and we went and saw where the shootings took place. Quite undramatic, except for a bullet hole in a sculpture. Looked like any suburban college campus. A grand jury indicted students for getting shot at.

But Kent State later gave us Devo.

Devolution, indeed.

[PoindexterOglethorpe]

25. I'd been on vacation in Australia,

and was in Hawaii for a couple of days on the way back. I would have been in Hawaii when I heard the news.

[revmclaren]

26. In elementary school in California.

Only! 2018 - 2020.

[greatauntoftriplets]

27. I was in Evanston, IL, and a junior in college.

It was a scary day.

[mantis49]

28. I was a junior in high school.

Remember seeing news coverage after school.

It definitely had a role in my forming political views, along with the civil rights movement and the Vietnam War.

[Ferrets are Cool]

29. I was 17 and I think

I saw it reported by Walter Cronkite.

[Kittycow]

145. Me too. Smallish town in Oregon. Hippies were frowned on.

But Four Dead in Ohio song cemented it in my heart to this day.

[Ferrets are Cool]

146. Tin soldiers and Nixon coming, We're finally on our own.

[Yonnie3]

30. I don't specifically remember that afternoon, but sure remember the immediate aftermath.

I do remember that evening as we gathered in groups at UVa and discussed it. Sorrow turned to anger. Protests started and the college was unable to operate. Kunsler and Rubin spoke. Things came to a head on Friday the 8th and I narrowly escaped being arrested with the more than 60 arrested at the Rotunda demonstration. On Sunday the 10th the UVa President made a speech on the steps of the Rotunda.

On May 10, President Shannon addressed students from the Rotunda steps. He noted that the University was the only one on the East Coast to remain open, and that he intended it to stay open. He told students that he was proud of them: “All of our students are deeply concerned about the war, some to the point where in an agony of conscience they want to act, not to study.” He condemned the “anti-intellectualism and growing militarism in the national government.”

He condemned the Nixon administration’s decision to invade Cambodia. And then he urged Virginia senators Spong and Byrd to act with fellow members of the Senate “in reasserting the authority of the Senate over the foreign policy of the United States and the use of armed forces in its support.” Soon after this speech, at graduation, Mr. Shannon received a standing ovation from students, faculty, parents, and alumni.

from:http://president.virginia.edu/history/shannon

“anti-intellectualism and growing militarism in the national government.” , sound familiar?

I was almost 20 at the time.

[Thunderbeast]

31. I was in high school

but working full time on the Oregon campaign to lower the voting age to 19 from the then current 21. Our campaign director was a 22 year-old student named Earl Blunenauer who is now my Congressman.

The campaign was losing in the polls, but the Kent State massacre solidified reaction to the left wing hippie movement. The ballot measure was crushed.

[jalan48]

32. I was a junior at the U of W in Seattle. We had protests at our school as a result of the killings.

[csziggy]

33. It happened the spring I was graduating from high school

My parents were really worried - my older sister was actively protesting the Vietnam War and I was heading to a liberal college. They thought one or the other of us might end up getting shot in a protest or even as a bystander as some of the students shot were.

[CaliforniaPeggy]

34. I remember it--I was a young wife and mom with a 4 year old daughter at home...

I wasn't as political then as I am now, but this incident shocked me.

I'd been antiwar for some time; even campaigned for Eugene McCarthy.

[Hekate]

114. Do you know I still have my Gene McCarthy campaign materials, including the "daisy" bumperstickers

That campaign was really seminal for me.

[Ilsa]

35. Middle schooler.

It was very confusing, and made no sense to me. Pockets of conservative Texas thought the war protesters were unAmerican. There were extremists declaring that the students "asked for it." But I couldn't rationalize how American adults in the National Guard (to me, that was the military) could justify shooting American young people.

Later, it felt like that was the beginning of the end of the war.spilling American blood, on American soil, was too visible for the nation, I think.

[grantcart]

36. In college, organizing a teach in to explain the bombings in Cambodia

[49jim]

37. I just finished my third year of college. NT

[MrScorpio]

38. I was like 8 years old at the time...

So not by much.

[Squinch]

129. I was 8 too, but I do remember being conscious of the assasinations and

of these killings, and all of them frightening me. Kent state did, I think, because my brother was going to college in the midwest.

[fmdaddio]

39. First year of high school

Jeff Miller one of the four students killed went to my school a few years before me. His families house was directly across the street from the school. It was the beginning of my political awakening. It was also my first but not last protest march. I still can remember the feeling of rage I felt over the killings.

[a kennedy]

40. I was 20 years old......

marched on the Madison, WI campus was gassed and was sick about the shooting at Kent State.

[Blue_Tires]

41. Wasn't born yet

But I do remember in past years that we had this thread there were a couple of DUers I've long since forgotten who were actually in the crowd that day...

[Gothmog]

42. I was still in elementary school but I remember this

[MineralMan]

43. Thanks for all the responses. Keep them coming.

This is your thread, everyone!

[john657]

44. I was on my 2nd tour of duty in Vietnam when this happened

my first thought was, oh shit, this is going to be very bad, students being killed for exercising a constitutional right.

[TexasBushwhacker]

45. I was in 8th grade

I took American history that year, which included learning about the Constitution and the Bill of Rights. I grew up reading the newspaper and reading the front page, I didn't understand how the Guard could open fire on UNARMED protestor. My parents were Republicans, but even they knew it was wrong.

[dameatball]

46. I was a freshman in college in FL.

There were a few hundred protestors, a lot of local police, lots of media but no real violence fortunately. But in those days, protests were pretty common, so the killings were truly shocking when news got out.

[Laffy Kat]

47. Still in Memphis. Must have been seventh grade at that time.

I didn't entirely understand. Remember seeing some of the news coverage and hearing my parents discuss it.

[Hekate]

48. U of Hawai'i, and glad to be there. I didn't understand the Mainland and the violence sickened me

My family moved back to SoCal the year I graduated from high school and I took myself back home to Oahu in the fall semester of 1968. The violence tearing the country apart didn't threaten me physically, only psychically. The day I got to LAX to take my plane home, a plane from Chicago was disgorging many passengers wearing black armbands after being present for the DNC and associated police riots. A friend of a friend had been there: his office was invaded by cops out for blood during those days of the Convention and he was thrown against the filing cabinets. One of my roomies at UH was a freshman from a Detroit suburb who had watched the burning Detroit skyline from her backyard.

In my later, adult, years in California I have met people for whom the violence was up close and personal: a professor who was a student at Kent State when the killings took place; a librarian who was a student at Berkeley when classrooms had to be changed on a moment's notice due to tear gas, and who wore clogs because of walking across broken glass.

For me, by the time 4 students were killed by National Guardsmen at Kent State, I thought this might never end.

[Stargleamer]

49. How many of you remember Jackson State several weeks later?

Yes, I remember Kent State as well as Jackson State, which I think was less publicized

[rurallib]

100. I remember the images on TV that night

[Canoe52]

50. Freshman in college, Illinois.

[Scurrilous]

51. Mary Ann Vecchio briefly attended my high school afterward.

Stayed long enough to get her pic in the '71 - '72 Hialeah-Miami Lakes High School yearbook (I still have my copy).

Then she drifted off...

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mary_Ann_Vecchio

[Capperdan]

52. The next day was Armed Forces Day

I was in an Army Reserve unit and marched in a parade in LA. I carried a rifle next to the flag in the color guard. Our commander ordered us to fix bayonets to protect the flag. We refused. Luckily, all was peaceful. "What if you knew her and found her dead on the ground?"

[Boxerfan]

53. My Mom was on the cover of Time (Not really)

But when we received the issue with the cover of Kent State- A woman in horror over a student-covered in blood-we started getting calls from relatives and friends asking what my Mom was doing there. She was merely similar in appearance & that photo captured it.

I was 8 years old.

[rzemanfl]

54. Pursuing an advanced degree somewhere in the continental U.S. I am not saying more because I

don't want Snopes snooping around. See what happens when you get famous?

[Brother Buzz]

55. SF Bay Area

We had more then our share of protests going on then, and I was in the thick of it; the May student strike was in full force on the West Coast. The Kent State tragedy got a ton of coverage and it fueled our resolve.

[kairos12]

56. I was in 8th Grade in Houston, Tx.

I mentioned the incident to a Science Teacher I really liked and respected. He said the protesters deserved to be shot.

I learned much that today about how knowledge doesn't equal wisdom or justice.

[lunasun]

163. +++ I have figured that out also ....

[catrose]

169. Senior in high school, South Louisiana

In tears over it, but feeling it had been inevitable, with all the hatred towards the protesters.

My mother said the same thing. I couldn't understand how you could say that about anybody. It was a turning point in our already lousy relationship.

"We're finally on our own..."

[infullview]

57. gotta get down to it, soldiers are cutting us down....

4 dead in O-hi-o...... Freshman in highschool

[LisaM]

58. I was in Michigan, in Junior High.

I was already prone to acute despair over politics anyway, and this one upset me. I tastefully kept the iconic photo of the dead students on my bedroom wall for years.

[Elwood P Dowd]

59. I was out of college, working, and waiting for my draft notice May 4, 1970.

Left work, grabbed a 6-pack and tried to cope as best I could. May-June of 1970 was one disaster after another.

[50 Shades Of Blue]

60. High school senior in DC area.

[Doc_Technical]

61. Living at home

getting ready to go into the Air Force. Lottery number 63

[MineralMan]

64. I enlisted in the USAF in 1965. No lottery then.

The day after I got my notice to report for a physical, I was on a plane to Lackland AFB for Basic. I had arranged to enlist in advance with the USAF recruiter in Santa Barbara, where I lived at the time. He told me that when I got the notice to report to come in and he'd get me in the next day. He did.

[Glorfindel]

62. I was back home in north Georgia, working, out of the Army for three years

and feeling, much like today, that everything was just snowballing out of control. Thanks for an interesting question.

[MineralMan]

67. I was curious to hear where people were at the time.

We have a lot of people on DU for whom that day was a big deal in their lives. I think it's important to discover why directly from them.

Many DUers aren't aware of how many people of an age to remember that are here on DU. This illustrates that very well.

[Glorfindel]

107. Well, you have set me to thinking, MineralMan

The year I spent in Vietnam was 1967, 49 years after the end of World War I.

It has now been 47 years since the Kent State massacre.

I wonder how many people are still alive (in the WORLD) who can remember the first Armistice Day? Good grief, how swiftly time passes.

Time to pause and reflect:

[tosh]

63. I was finishing up 6th grade and almost 12.

I was very much aware of what was going on because of my brother, my only sibling, who was 11 years older than me.

[pwb]

65. Yes, I was in Nam.

The national guard back then was full of draft dodgers and rich kids. They pissed me off doing that.

[Elwood P Dowd]

77. You're right about that.

They also were the worst troops in my Army Basic Training unit......knuckleheads and goof offs constantly getting the rest of us in trouble with the Drill Sergeants.

[Hoyt]

168. Can't disagree, but regular military had plenty of gung-ho types ready to kill innocent Asians too.

Not a good time. I decided going into 4th year of ROTC that I would would take my chances with a draft number of 30 before I’d sign a contract to be one of the fuckers who were ROTC “officers” or the losers who rotated in as instructors after serving in Vietnam. Christ, what a bunch of losers.

The only military I truly respect from that time were draftees or those who joined up in lieu of being drafted. People totally conflicted get my empathy whatever they chose. Gung-ho types, still alive, likely voted for trump unless they woke up.

[JenniferJuniper]

66. 8 years old; picked up the paper

just after the paperboy delivered and saw the picture of the girl screaming over the dead boy's body.

I'm reasonably sure the story and the image permanently shaped my politics.

[MineralMan]

70. Wow! That must have made an impression on you.

I'm very sorry you had to see that at such a young age.

[JenniferJuniper]

78. Such were the times.

Kids our age weren't able to avoid much then. No one worried much about sheltering us.

My first memory outside of my own little world was RFK's assassination. I remember feeling so bad for all those kids....

[MineralMan]

108. Yes.

I love your screen name, too. That Donovan song often streams in my brain.

[LeftInTX]

68. 8th grade. Saw it on the evening news.

I sighed, "Just another day in America"
I felt like I do after mass shootings.

I didn't read the papers or dwell on the details. I was only 13 and not very savvy.

[Freddie]

106. Me too, 8th grade

I vaguely remember seeing it on the news and reading about it in Life mag. Was in the Pennsylvania suburbs and it seemed so far away and we were so sheltered. My parents were worried sick about my brother who was a junior in HS getting drafted. Lucky for him the draft ended while he was in college.

[lillypaddle]

69. I was young, married

and had a year + old child, who will be 50 this June (!!!!) Saw it on the news. Later, my father told me that those kids got what they deserved. I will never forget that, and the hate I felt toward him and the government.

[MineralMan]

71. How sad that your father said that!

I'm sorry to hear it.

[lillypaddle]

73. Yeah, he was a real Archie Bunker

[LeftInTX]

121. So was my dad.

I decided not to bring the subject up after I knew his views.

He served in Vietnam when I was 10 (1966).

When I became interested in anti-war views, he shot me down. Fortunately, I was not old enough to leave town and protest. However, our anti-war views were welcome and taught at our high school. (Much to my dad's dismay)

[lillypaddle]

148. Wow, those were horrific times

in ways that can't even be explained. The music of the times did a good job of trying ...

[Alea]

103. I think this was the general attitude of the day for many people.

I saw an old news clip where a reporter was talking to a lady from the town just after the shooting. She said "They should have killed them all." How could things be so bad that she could say that?

[LeftInTX]

122. They felt threatened by

Long haired commies...

Seriously, that is what I constantly heard. "If the war ends, communism will spread all over the world".

They really felt this way. They felt war protesters were treasonous. They lumped all protesters into the groups that were engaged in violent radicalism.

[Freddie]

132. That's how Nixon won

He promised to keep those dirty hippies and protesters out of your sleepy little town. There was some real hate coming from the older generation, even towards their own kids. I think we boomers are a lot closer to our children than our parents were to us.

[lillypaddle]

147. It was beyond me

these were their children, FFS! May we never have a time like that again in this country. However, that being said, I think about the untold number of black and POC innocents who have been mowed down by our protectors, the cops. Pigs. Even today that is how I think of them.

[WhiteTara]

72. We drove into SF that afternoon.

I joined the antiwar movement the next day.

[MineralMan]

74. Thank you for doing that!

I had already been protesting the war for a few years, in DC and then California. Kent State activated a lot of people, I remember.

[KPN]

75. I was in a friend's driveway playing hoops

when another friend pulled in and told us what he'd just heard on the radio.

[mopinko]

76. should have added vaguely remember it.

i was in high school. i remember the song, knew what it was about, and wanting richard nixon to hang.

[planetc]

79. Terre Haute, Indiana, teaching at the Univ.

I came to political consciousness in 1963, when they got John Kennedy. Then in 1968, they got Robert Kennedy and Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr. I doubted the reports identifying their killers, and still do. Faceless and powerful people wanted them dead, so they died. When news of Kent state came through, I realized the protesters were being given their warning.

[CanisCrocinus]

80. in college

We felt like war had been declared, on us.

[MuseRider]

81. Junior in High School

I was unaware of it until I went to school the next day. My parents did not watch the news, they were tired of all the war coverage.

[DFW]

82. In my senior year of high school

I felt then pretty much the way I feel now every time I read about some uniform with a gun killing someone without one: it's the general attitude of the government that enables worms like this to commit murder, and then think their actions are somehow justified.

[heaven05]

83. I was at Boston U.

my thought was this is serious, they are killing unarmed college protestors. I was surprised.

[Submariner]

84. Just finished my 4 year Navy hitch

and was working for AT&T. Soon after, became a longhair hippie veteran on university campus demonstrating with fellow Vietnam-era vets in John Kerry's VVAW organization.

[Hamlette]

85. it was the day after my 20th birthday. I was in college. Remember it well. n/t

[jpak]

86. I remember - it was fucking shocking - and we had a sit-down in high school the next day.

The teachers were furious.

Most of them proclaimed "they deserved it".

[samplegirl]

87. I do I was there for little sis week.

Had to leave in a hurry! Pretty scary as I was all of about 12 years old.

[maveric]

88. Salem NH. About to graduate eighth grade in a month or so.

Watched it on TV after school. It seemed like the end of innocence from the 60s.
Scared the shit out of me.

[prairierose]

89. I was a freshman in high school in

South Dakota, participating in protests at the nearest university.

[Alea]

90. It was ancient history to me by the time I learned about it.

However, last year I went on a quest for knowledge to learn everything I could about it. Before that, I had only heard of it a few times and we discussed once or twice in high school. Learning the whole story in depth was both sad and amazing. 2 of the students killed were not even protesting. Just walking to class, and no student involved wanted what eventually happened. I'm in college now but because I went into the Army for 8 years, I'm older than most of the students here. When I think about these 19 and 20 year old kids that wanted nothing more than change, being shot like this, it overwhelms the imagination.

Jeffrey Glenn Miller; age 20; 265 ft (81 m) shot through the mouth; killed instantly

Allison B. Krause; age 19; 343 ft (105 m) fatal left chest wound; died later that day

William Knox Schroeder; age 19; 382 ft (116 m) fatal chest wound; died almost an hour later in a local hospital while undergoing surgery

Sandra Lee Scheuer; age 20; 390 ft (120 m) fatal neck wound; died a few minutes later from loss of blood

Look at the ages : ( I never knew you, but you are not forgotten.

Interesting factoid - In this picture, taken at the moment the shooting was happening, look at the man on the left with a pistol. He was the leader if this group of Guardsmen. There were other groups but this is the group that opened fire. This man claims he never fired and the investigation couldn't determine if he fired or not. That's an Army Colt 45 with the slide to the rear, so he's either running around with his slide locked back, which no one does, or the picture caught him at the moment he fired, or the moment he finished firing. With that gun the slide goes back with each shot and also locks back when the last shot is fired from the clip. How can they not figure this shit out?? We can never know the full truth sometimes.



There's larger better pics of this on google but I didn't want to post a large pic here and couldn't find a way to just post the link without having the pic appear in the post.

Good thread MineralMan. Thanks for posting!

[fleabiscuit]

91. A short video from Dan Rather videos.

Sorry for the Facebook link, I could not find it on youtube.

https://www.facebook.com/theDanRather/videos/10160363705850716/?t=569

[Alea]

98. Thanks fleabiscuit

A very well done video I hadn't seen before. I have seen that professor in other interviews. He was right there in the middle of it and I bet there's never a day that goes by that he, or anyone there, doesn't think about that day.

[arthritisR_US]

92. I was 14, in middle school. It was into my

second year living permanently in Canada 🇨🇦

[GrapesOfWrath]

93. 4th grade in Houston

I remember the television coverage...

[aka-chmeee]

94. Was in Dayton, Ohio

Attending initial training for job with NCR. Was drafted before end of that schooling. Lived in part of Dayton called the student ghetto because of the large college population in the area.

[Ligyron]

95. High school in Florida.

[fierywoman]

96. Sophomore in college in Potsdam, NY

[annabanana]

97. NYU

horrified

[rurallib]

99. I believe I was at a rally back at the U of Iowa that day

things are a bit mushed together for that time period.

My recollection is that there was an anti-war rally at the Old capitol on the U of Iowa campus.
It was in the morning so actually before the Kent State massacre.
Our democratic senator Harold Hughes addressed the crowd from the step of the Old Capitol. I was on the steps quite close to him as I had been recruited as a body guard of sorts.

This did happen and I think it was on that day. It was close to that day for sure.

I sure remember there was a tenseness it the atmosphere. Police were nearby. Our rally went smoothly and broke up after about an hour. I think there was still an hour or so before Kent State.

When I heard about it I was having lunch with some friends. We all just got sad.

[OilemFirchen]

101. I was 15, in high school in Dayton.

My eldest brother was at BGSU.

Nothing before and nothing since has shaken me so dramatically.

[Dyedinthewoolliberal]

102. In the Marine Corps

stationed at Camp Pendleton where we were discharging Marines fresh back from the 'Nam. Some literally were in the bush a week before getting discharged..........

[Vinca]

104. I remember it. I had been living in Ohio and remember getting college info from Kent.

As it turns out, I took off and hit the road instead. I'm not sure if I was in Vermont or Florida then . . . it's all a blur.

[DinahMoeHum]

105. I was in 8th grade back then.

Many years later, I met the folk music duo Magpie, Terry Leonino and Greg Artzner.

Terry Leonino was a student at Kent State and an eyewitness to what happened that day.

This song below is about a professor at KSU, Glenn Frank (who had been a US Marine before becoming a professor), who was instrumental in calming down the campus in the aftermath of the shootings.

[MineralMan]

109. Again, thanks for all the replies!

It's your thread and you're sharing your experiences of it. Keep the conversation going!

[FailureToCommunicate]

139. We really appreciate you asking for our memories!

(While we **still** have them)

[MineralMan]

141. They're great to read!

I'm surprised at how many people ha responded.

[FailureToCommunicate]

142. Well, you shouldn't be. Beyond the subject matter, just your name on a post makes people

sit up straight and pay attention!



(Also, so glad to hear you are doing well)

[redstateblues]

110. I was a senior at Emory University in Atlanta

[Golden Raisin]

111. I was in college (upstate New York)

and already active in Vietnam War protests. 48 years later I VIVIDLY remember the horror of that day. The message being sent from Nixon on down was blood-chilling, final and unmistakable.

[raven mad]

112. Fairbanks, Alaska

Where UAF and my high school held protests and wakes.

[Maeve]

113. I was 14, living about an hour south of Columbus, OH

People were blaming the kids for protesting, never mind the fact that the National Guard were little more than kids themselves...and we were scared what this might mean for the country as a whole. And for many of us, any trust in politicians was shattered.

[BarbaRosa]

115. I was 20,

recently returned stateside from Australia (I had spent a year or so with my family) and was facing the world as a young man rather than the son in a group of four. I particularly remember being at the laundromat and hearing the news.

[onethatcares]

116. working at my first job

after leaving home. I think it was at Sears

[FailureToCommunicate]

117. Senior in High School. We organized a general school strike from my house for May 8th...

Schoolkids and teachers from all over Westchester County walked out of school and processed to a huge rally in a city park near White Plains.

[Raine]

118. I was in college myself

my history professor talked about how it was like the Bostan Massacre.

[Hekate]

119. This thread is making me choke up, MM. I remember being shocked but NOT surprised...

It felt to me like the authorities had been building up to this for a long time, and this was both a culmination and a warning of things to come.

[MineralMan]

136. Yes. It's bringing everyone's personal memories

To the front. I'm so glad so many are sharing. Usually, polls like this get little attention.

[doc03]

120. I had just got out of the Army in March. The Saturday following Kent State

I started my job in Wheeling Pittsburgh Steel where I retired from in 2009.

[Exotica]

123. I am feeling the gender gap here. I was not born until a quarter of a century

after the Kent State shootings. I think the same types who cheered this murderous state action on (I am sure there were 10's of millions) are the same types who voted for Trump 46 years later and who yearn for the bad old 'white-power-as-institutional-control' days.

[Squinch]

124. How many remember the Orangeburg killings at South Carolina State in 1968?

A historically black school, so much less was reported about it.

3 killed and 27 injured by SC state police. The police said they thought they were being attacked. One of the dead was a high school kid just sitting on the steps of a dorm while he waited for his mother to finish her work shift at the college.

[coeur_de_lion]

125. I was only 10

Had just turned 10 a few days before.

I remember the famous photo was all over the newspaper.

I wanted to protest too!

But I was too young and probably just went back to playing with my friends.

[VOX]

126. I was attending San Fernando Valley State College (now CSU Northridge)...

Which, for a small, once-upon-a-time "horse-y town," was its own hotbed of protest. There was a kidnapping of staff by the Black Students Union (they walked them across campus and shut them in the Admin. Bldg.); hundreds of protesting students were arrested en masse; the top floor of the Administration Building was torched; a police riot on campus took place in January 1969. When the news of Kent State broke in 1970, classes were suspended and the semester was ended as quickly as possible, within two weeks.

It was an astonishing time to be 19 years old, in college and facing the draft (until I got a high lottery number).

[honest.abe]

127. It freaked me out.

I was in high school in illinois.

[airmid]

128. I was seven and living in Middletown Ohio.

[RKP5637]

130. I was in the apt we shared in college lying on the sofa when it came on the TV. n/t

[PJMcK]

131. I remember it clearly

That happened when I was in junior high school and it was shocking to me. We lived in suburban Connecticut and this kind of behavior happened in Eastern Europe, not in the United States.

Kids at my school scheduled an after-school protest march and I participated by painting signs and walking the two miles from the school to the town hall. It was my first politically "activist" event. We actually got a little bit of press coverage in those pre-internet/pre-cable TV days.

At the time, I had just begun to pay attention to politics and current events and it was a searing moment.

My brother, who is five years younger than I, has no memory of the event. However, he went to Kent State for his Bachelor's Degree and each time I visited him, we would go to the memorial and library. Although I'm an atheist, it's a hallowed space.

[LastLiberal in PalmSprings]

133. I was a junior at the University of Missouri - Columbia.

This image is forever seared in my memory:



My thought was, "How could Americans do this to Americans?"

[eleny]

134. In a college class, NYC

Learned about it when I got home that evening.

[guillaumeb]

135. Attending university.

[MaryMagdaline]

137. Was vaguely aware of it but much more aware

When Tin Soldiers song came out. (Ohio)

[Haggis for Breakfast]

166. The Song was by Crosby, Stills, Nash and Young

It was actually Neil Young who wrote the song.

Tin soldiers and Nixon's coming,
We're finally on our own.
This summer I hear the drumming,
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 that would have been Sandra Scheuer who bled out.
And found her dead on the ground ?
How could you run when you know ?

[MaryMagdaline]

191. Yea my cousin posted the song on FB yesterday

[TomSlick]

140. In high school.

[Alea]

143. So are these the people the establishment was afraid of?

Because it looks like a beautiful movement they tried to crush

My favorite old song and I don't even know why I like it so much.

[MineralMan]

144. Yeah, pretty much.

Now, it's the kids from that Florida high school and all of the others they inspired. Now, IRS their turn...

[Wolf Frankula]

149. I was in High School

Some of us declared that if the National Guard shot at us, we were going to goddam well shoot back.

Wolf

[FarCenter]

150. I was probably at work. I can't recall it making too much of an impression.

LBJ and Nixon had already killed 10s of thousands of kids by then.

[redwitch]

151. Junior High in NJ

An awful and shocking day.

[Frances]

152. I was at a friend's house in Woburn, MA

[orangecrush]

153. Remember it clearly

John Filo, the photographer who took this photo, was from my hometown.

[raging moderate]

154. I was at Southern Illinois University in Carbondale.

There were many marches and demonstrations, and I was in most of them. I also remember that almost the exact same thing happened at almost the same time, at Jackson State University. And those students were Black. And one young man shot by the National Guard at Jackson State University was actually not in the demonstration or at the demonstration site. He had just finished his shift at his job, and he was on his way home to his young wife and his new baby.

[dflprincess]

155. I was a junior in high school

I remember my Anthropology teacher (who was probably 25 at most) coming into the room and slamming her books down on the desk, mad as hell. We spent the whole hour venting.

Probably about 15 years ago (or more) I had my mom at the grocery store when the cashier & carry-out were discussing the history test they had that day. The cashier said she had done pretty well except she couldn't remember the date of Kent State. Naturally I blurted out the date and my poor mother looked at the cashier and said "Please don't get her started." The cashier said to Mom "My mother got really upset when I told her I didn't remember the date."

If you can remember it, you'll never forget it.

[ladym55]

156. I was a sophmore in high school

It was my 15th birthday.

[DBoon]

158. This entire post says something about the boomer generation

and it is not the typical "those selfish bastards ruined it for the rest of us"

Every time I see one of those posts, I think here is someone trying to erase the history of what actually happened

[PJMcK]

180. That's a profound thought, DBoon

You might consider expanding your thoughts into an OP. I think you have something important to say.

Enjoy your weekend!

[MineralMan]

192. Yes, it does. I hope that gets noticed.

[Mugu]

159. I was a junior in high school.

[John1956PA]

160. Eighth grade history class.

[karynnj]

161. I remember it and I was at Indiana University then

The college administration sponsored a candle light March to honor those who died. I think this might have been done because many students were terrified and they wanted to assure them we were safe.

[herding cats]

162. I was a working on learning to talk in two word sentences and struggling with grasping pronouns.

Suffice to say; I don't remember anything about it.

However, I have a vivid memory of when Nixon resigned. I was forced by my grandparents to sit quietly in front of their console TV, not make a sound and pay full attention to his resignation speech. I was told not to fidget or move my eyes from the screen. It was excruciating for a pre-K child and I was frightened because it wasn't normal. If I close my eyes I still remember his face on that screen to this day.

[McCamy Taylor]

164. Sixth grade.

I remember the JFK funeral. I was 4. It is my first political memory, and that is why I call my generation "Generation JFK." I remember the "Daisy Ad", the MLK Assassination, the RFK Assassination, the 1968 Democratic Convention. I remember 1972 and I watched the Watergate Hearings the summer I turned 14.

TV news was a lot more "real" back then. Now it is mostly bullshit.

[Haggis for Breakfast]

165. I was a senior in high school

We lived less than an hour's drive from Kent. I was active in Little Theater then and our director had graduated from Kent State with a degree in Theater Arts. Every Spring, Kent State put on a Shakespeare Festival. That year he had managed to get permission for all of us in the troupe to go down there on Saturday and watch "Taming of the Shrew." It was the weekend before the shooting.

Allison Krause
Sandra Scheuer
Jeffrey Miller THESE WERE THE UNARMED CHILDREN SHOT AND KILLED
William Schroeder FOUR DEAD IN OHIO

[KT2000]

167. I was a senior in high school

We left school and went to downtown Seattle where there was a rally. We all left and marched on the freeway. The police arrived in buses and they headed up to the freeway with badges and ID removed and chased us with pepper spray or mace and their billy clubs. I got hit on the ankles and got the spray in my face. We were run off the freeway and walked past the Plymouth Cong. Church where a janitor came out and offered to let us use their water fountains to clean our faces.
To me it seemed that the assassination of the Kent State students was followed by police brutality and the kindness of one man.

[Tracyjo]

170. I was a little kid.

I new nothing about it until Jr. High. I was only a teenager when I heard about it. Way before it happened.

[GeorgeGist]

171. Ann Arbor.

[Historic NY]

172. HS Freshman wondering WTF was going on...

an if in a couple years I'd be drafted. I was at the place where one of the Berrigan Bros. taught.

[mnhtnbb]

173. I was a student at UCLA

just finishing my freshman year.. They closed the campus. I went home to San Diego county.

We were all horrified.

[phylny]

174. I was 12. It was the day before my birthday.

I remember it on the news, and of course the iconic picture.

[Hortensis]

181. i was home with our first, month-old baby,

and I see now that we were slipping into a new period where I didn't want to let what was happening "out there" come too strongly into our lives. Even though we were in L.A. where protests and other events were happening, we read the L.A. Times over breakfast and watched the evening news, but that was all. Our tiny son was the center of our lives. I remember far more vividly the wonderful new look on his face when he was finally able to hold his his head up without that dreadful straining and look around the safe world we created for him.

[Homer Wells]

175. Fresh back from VietNam

Home on leave, and preparing for my assignment in Fairbanks, Alaska.
My grandmother had passed away just a few days before. A sad time.

[Are_grits_groceries]

176. I was a Junior in High School.

Watching the country and world keep falling apart.
Remember, we had already witnessed riots, assasinations and other horrible acts. We never recovered completely.

[wasupaloopa]

177. I was in Dayton Ohio

[Demovictory9]

178. i grew up hearing about it, but didnt' live the event

[wendyb-NC]

179. I was a sophomore in High school.

[sellitman]

182. I was 14 years old

I remember the horror. It dominated the news and shocked us all.

[Guilded Lilly]

183. I was 16 and in high school just outside of Pittsburgh

It was the first time I actually remember being physically afraid of just being a normal American teenager. About a month before my best friend and I visited her sister who was going to Kent.

[cyclonefence]

184. Housecleaning in our first home

with NPR on the radio. I sat down on the floor. It was unbelievable, literally unbelievable. The sun was shining on a beautiful day, and then this.

[rgbecker]

185. US Army, Berlin, Gemany. Short-timer, with just a couple of months to go.

Since then I did some carpentry work for the guy assigned by the Ohio NG to investigate the shooting. He was a young officer in the Ohio National Guard and the conclusion was that the National Guard was full of untrained scared kids . I note that they were wearing gas masks and can tell you from my experience wearing those while doing rifle range shooting puts you in another disconnected reality. I'm not making excuses, for sure, but can see how the situation could easily get out of control. Why anybody thought it a good idea to send troops to college campuses to control demonstrations with live ammo is the real question.

[GWC58]

186. At the time I was almost 12 & in

elementary school. It was a big event at the time.

[secondwind]

187. I was a young housewife with a 3 yr old. Living in NYC. Will never forget this.

[captain queeg]

188. I was in a small town about 15 mikes outside KSU

My brother was a commuter student at Kent, came home and told us about it.

I’d posted about this a few months ago; I was going to Kent myself 6 years later. Had a weekend job as a security guard at a factory near there. One of the things we had to do (totally embarrassed me) was check the guys lunch boxes when they were leaving, in case anyone was stealing parts to their miserable little devices. I got talking to one of the old timers and when he found out I was a student from KSU he told me at the time it happened he was one of those who would say “they should have shot a few more”. That was the common refrain when it happened. But he said now that it had been a few years he realized how terrible it was and should never have come to something like that. It gives me some hope that people can change their minds, hope that is still true.

[kpete]

189. Honolulu

Senior at Kalani HS

[Runningdawg]

190. Well this is embarrassing

I was 10 years old but my family were fundies. I actually believed it was the students fault. Hippies were synonymous with the devil and protesters were commies. I remember there was a big prayer meeting that night and everyone holding candles and singing "Onward Christian Soldiers".

[MineralMan]

193. Saturday Morning, and I want to thank everyone again who posted

in this thread. I can't reply to all of the posts, but please know that I read them all and was touched by many of them. There are so many DUers who remember that day. That's something many of the younger DUers don't recognize at times. Often we Baby Boomer are seen as old and irrelevant. That's too bad.

We remember many things. Many of us participated in the civil rights movement, protested against the Vietnam war, and campaigned hard for progressive candidates. Many of us are still doing the same things today.

Yes, we're getting old, but that doesn't mean we don't have the same principles we had then. Some of those principles were shaped by events like the Kent State shootings.

Thanks again, everyone!

[Nay]

194. I was in college in Florida -- everyone was terrified and very angry. It felt like the

beginning of a war -- on us.

[displacedtexan]

195. I was a freshman at TCU.

The governor of Ohio had been on the national evening news calling student protesters Brown Shirts and Un-American for weeks. He made the protests a win-lose situation, and he was determined to win.

[JohnnyRingo]

196. I'm 65 and about 30 miles east.

I was still in high school, but it was a big deal here. I had a lot of friends attend there and I'm going to a concert at Kent Stage next month.

Some years ago at work, I was discussing the event in the cafeteria when a tow motor operator spoke up to say he was there that day. I told him I did know he was a student there and he replied "I wasn't". It got quiet when we all suddenly realized what that meant.

I saw the apology the guardsmen signed on an episode of Antiques Roadshow and his name is near the top. I don't want to believe Larry pulled a trigger though.

[captain queeg]

197. I see this thread is still going, thought I'd add a bit to my previous post.

Back in the 70s, don’t remember the year. I used to have a paper route and I’d make
My last stop at a a beverage store. And have a coke. One day the local paper ran an an article about Armstrong, don’t even remember his first name now. The most decorated soldier from
Ohio since WWII (sorry Armstrong) I started razzing him I didn’t know he was a hero being too stupid of a twat to shut up. He lost it a smashed my head thru a triple pane glass door. He apologized the next time I saw him and I never held it against him.

I personally think when we switched to a volunteer army America lost its waybb