“Four Dead in O-HI-O!”

I remember being stunned / shocked looking at the photos of the dead at Kent State Massacre in Life Magazine. These kids were just a few years older than me. I just stared at the pictures and wished I could bring them back. It was a make-believe wish, silly for a teenager, but the shootings were so ‘unreal’. That issue of Life was retained in my ‘keep box’. The shootings impacted how I saw the country, politics and the protests of the 1960’s. Nixon’s ‘Law and Order’ meant Kent State. My socialist mother’s support McCarthy in 1968 had context. She wasn’t so whacky after all.

How Life Magazine covered the Kent State killings:
https://www.life.com/history/life-magazine-kent-state/

As I remember it, the entire nation was horrified. Troops firing on college students was unthinkable. They were not firing in to the air …they were taking aim.

…of course, young GI’s of the same age were dying daily in a mis-guided war in Vietnam at the same time...

I wonder if it would be the same today …if the nation would be collectively horrified at the military (or any law enforcement agency) firing on protesting civilians… because I do believe it will happen.

The words of the Ohio governor in May 1970 before the Kent State Massacre are the same kind used by our president and his stooges: radicals, leftists, ANTIFA, ‘very bad people’, ‘enemies of the people‘.

My memory of the state of consciousness of the nation was a bit optimistic. Immediately after the shootings, nearly 90% of Americans polled blamed the students for what happened. A desire for ‘law and order’ prevailed.

In the immediate aftermath, students were blamed for the killings. James Stroh was a student [at KSC] but also a veteran of the Vietnam War.

“When I got home, my father was very upset. I mean totally upset,” he recalled. “Matter of fact, the words were such that my mother started shutting windows because it was getting loud and she didn’t want the neighbors to hear. My father’s only comment was they should’ve shot them all, and I said, ‘Well if they did, they would’ve shot me too.’ And he goes, ‘Well, if you were there they should’ve.’ That was in 1970.”

Only later did Americans come to realize the horror of Kent State, the futility of the war in Vietnam, and the deceit and crimes of the Nixon administration.

Despite Kent State and Cambodia and Laos and 15,000 more deaths in Vietnam in Nixon’s first term …he was re-elected by a landslide. And It could very well happen again.

Mark Twain is supposed to have said, “History doesn’t repeat itself, but it often rhymes”. The words from this president’s horrid mouth rhyme far too much with those of Ohio Governor Jim Rhodes in May 1970. That is dangerous.

During a press conference at the Kent firehouse on May 3, 1970 an emotional Governor Rhodes pounded on the desk, which can be heard in the recording of his speech. He called the student protesters un-American, referring to them as revolutionaries set on destroying higher education in Ohio.

We’ve seen here at the city of Kent especially, probably the most vicious form of campus-oriented violence yet perpetrated by dissident groups… they make definite plans of burning, destroying, and throwing rocks at police and at the National Guard and the Highway Patrol. …this is when we’re going to use every part of the law enforcement agency of Ohio to drive them out of Kent. We are going to eradicate the problem. We’re not going to treat the symptoms. …and these people just move from one campus to the other and terrorize the community. They’re worse than the brown shirts and the communist element and also the night riders and the vigilantes. They’re the worst type of people that we harbor in America. Now I want to say this. They are not going to take over [the] campus. I think that we’re up against the strongest, well-trained, militant, revolutionary group that has ever assembled in America.

“On April 30, 1970, President Nixon announced that he had sent the US military into Cambodia to destroy enemy military supply centers, which the anti-war protesters saw as an expansion of the war. The invasion aroused a storm of protests nation-wide, especially on college campuses. At Kent State University, protest demonstrations were called for May 1 and May 4. On the evening of May 1, protestors set fires and threw bottles at police cars, and attempted to set fire to the ROTC Building on the campus. The next day, Kent city mayor Leroy Satrom declared a state of emergency, and asked Ohio Governor James A. Rhodes to send the Ohio National Guard to help maintain order. Governor Rhodes sent the Guard onto the campus to put an end to the demonstrations. When the Guard arrived on campus the evening of May 2, over 1,000 protestors greeted the National Guardsmen with rocks and a large demonstration. The ROTC building was set on fire, and the city firemen were pelted with rocks when attempting to put out the fire. In Kent city, stores were vandalized and looted. About noon on May 4, following a demonstration on campus, as both sides were withdrawing, the National Guard suddenly fired about 65 rounds of ammunition at the demonstrators, killing 4 students and wounding 9, in what appeared to be a spontaneous massed weapons firing. Killed were students Allison Krause, Jeff Miller, Sandy Scheuer, and William Schroeder. Ironically, two of the four killed were not demonstrators, but were on their way to class and got caught in the barrage of shooting. The killings spurred more demonstrations on college campuses across the US. In October 1970, a state grand jury exonerated the Guardsmen of any wrongdoing. Two years later, in October 1972, the parents of the slain and wounded students filed suit in US District Court, demanding a federal grand jury, which was finally started in December 1973. Eight National Guardsmen were eventually tried in 1974, but the charges were dropped when it was ruled that prosecutors failed to prove their case. In January 1979, the parents of the slain and wounded students settled out of court for $675,000 and a “letter of regret” from Ohio officials.” [by Kit and Morgan Benson]

A physician who performed one of the autopsies said:

I’m thinking to myself, ‘My goodness, this is terrible. This is the United States of America and this should not be happening.’

Listen to Neil Young’s ‘Ohio’, look at the photo montage, and remember the horror of the day.

I believe something like it will happen again under this president: armed shock troops to take out and intimidate his so-called ‘enemies of the people‘ …which means anyone who does not agree with and/or submit to him –like me.

Tin soldiers and Nixon coming
We’re finally on our own
This summer I hear the drumming
Four dead in Ohio

Gotta get down to it, soldiers are cutting us down
Should have been gone long ago
What if you knew her and found her dead on the ground
How can you run when you know?

La-la-la-la, la-la-la-la
La-la-la-la, la-la-la
La-la-la-la, la-la-la-la
La-la-la-la, la-la-la

Gotta get down to it, soldiers are cutting us down
Should have been gone 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 coming
We’re finally on our own
This summer I hear the drumming
Four dead in Ohio

Four dead in Ohio (four)
Four dead in Ohio (I said four, I said four)
Four dead in Ohio (how many more?)
Four dead in Ohio (why?)
Four dead in Ohio (I wanna know why)
Four dead in Ohio (you better tell me why)
Four dead in Ohio (why?)
Four dead in Ohio (why did they die?)

Four dead in Ohio (you tell me why)
Four dead in Ohio (I said why)
Four dead in Ohio (I wanna know why)
Four dead in Ohio (why?)
Four dead in Ohio (I said why)
Four dead in Ohio (why, Lord?)
Four dead in Ohio (why did they die?)
Four dead in Ohio (I said why)

Four dead in Ohio (why?)
Four dead in Ohio (yeah, why?)
Four dead in Ohio (please tell me why)
Four dead in Ohio (why?)
Four dead in Ohio (I wanna know)
Four dead in Ohio (why?)
Four dead in Ohio (why did they died)
Four dead in Ohio (you tell me why)

Four dead in Ohio (why?)
Four dead in Ohio (why?)
Four dead in Ohio (why?)
Four dead in Ohio (why?)
Four dead in Ohio (why?)
Four dead in Ohio