Click HERE for video of press conference announcing release of 'Get Set! Point! Fire!' audiotape.

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How It Was: Death at Kent State
Tuesday, March 11, 2008, check your listings for local times.

On May 4th 1970, American soldiers shot down American students on American soil. Ever since, people have argued over who was to blame the protesting students at Kent State University or the National Guardsmen brought in to restore order on campus. By stripping away the rhetoric and dissecting the available evidence, National Geographic Channels How it Was: Death at Kent State casts a dispassionate eye on this national tragedy. The wealth of raw data generated by the event includes still photographs, news film footage, home movies, audio recordings and riveting testimony from key participants on both sides including the first television interview with one of the indicted National Guardsmen. This is Kent State as you've never seen it before.

Thirty years ago, trustees and protesters
faced off over the Gym Annex construction
Thirty years ago this summer, Kent State was embroiled in a controversy that had students pitted against university officials and culminated in 193 arrests.

This summer marks the 30th anniversary of the Gym Annex controversy or "Tent City," when students camped out for two months in 1977 to protest building an addition to the Memorial Gym on part of the May 4 site.[MORE]

::Summer Kent Stater 8/14/07

James Russell, 60, was survivor
of KSU shootings who shed anonymity
James Russell, the oldest of the nine students shot and injured during May 4, 1970, demonstrations at Kent State University, became the first of the survivors to die Saturday.

Russell, 60, died at his Deer Island, Ore., home of an apparent heart attack.

Russell, who converted his art training at Kent into a string of civil engineering jobs, had returned several times to the Kent State campus for remembrances of the shootings. Four students were killed when the National Guard opened fire on students protesting the Vietnam War and nine others were wounded.

Russell was shot in the leg and forehead. Friends and family say he had participated in other protests in Kent in the previous few days but had just paused to watch May 4 on the way to turn in an art project.

"We are living proof that we were targets that day," he said at the 2002 campus ceremony. "All of us were targets." [MORE]

::Cleveland Plain Dealer 6/26/07

Yale University alumnus Paul Keane tried unsuccessfully earlier this year to pursuade Yale to open the now closed Kent State special archives collection and accept the personal papers of former KSU President Glenn Olds. Keane issued numerous letters and e-mails to Yale University President Richard C. Levin without response until last week. [MORE]

::Record-Courier 6/26/07

DAN RATHER INTERVIEWS PROF. JERRY LEWIS: “Long after the names of the battles and the generals are forgotten, we remember wars through their images. During the Vietnam War, those images reverberate in a stark symmetry. There were the images from over there -– young G.I.’s in dense jungle firefights with the determined Vietcong and North Vietnamese, and then there were the images from over here -– young students in massive college campus protests clashing with national guardsmen.” [Click for TRANSCRIPT]

The lethal media silence on Kent State's smoking guns
The 1970 killings by National Guardsmen of four students during a peaceful anti-war demonstration at Kent State University have now been shown to be cold-blooded, premeditated official murder. But the definitive proof of this monumental historic reality is not, apparently, worthy of significant analysis or comment in today's mainstream media. [MORE]

::FreePress.org 5/06/07

May 4 Coverage in the Daily Kent Stater:

Peace talks
Sheehan asks students to combat war through non-violent means
On May 4, 1970, 12-year-old Cindy Sheehan could not understand why the National Guard killed four students at Kent State. "I remember the photos from here," Sheehan said Friday to a crowd gathered on Blanket Hill. "I couldn't understand why our people would kill our own.

Memories from May 4
For every student on campus, the events of May 4 were a different experience. Thirty-seven years later, a few decided to share their memories. Five people. Five angles. Five memories. One day: May 4, 1970. Laura Davis Associate Provost Laura Davis remembers May 4, 1970 as a day of earnest demonstration, both against the war and the presence of the National Guard.

MULTIMEDIA: May 4 Slideshow

Empty combat boots represent fallen Ohioans
Among the daffodils on the hill in front of the May 4 Memorial, 161 pairs of boots were displayed Friday to represent the Ohioans who have died in the Iraq war. Each pair of boots had a tag with the soldier's photograph, name, rank and hometown. The American Friends Service Committee, a Quaker-based non-profit organization, brought its "Eyes Wide Open Ohio" exhibit to Kent State.

Task Force rings bell for Va. Tech
When Sarah Lund-Goldstein, a member of the May 4 Task Force, heard about the Virginia Tech shootings, she knew she wanted to do something. To honor the victims, she came up with the idea of ringing Kent State's Victory Bell on the Commons. On Friday morning, students and community members gathered as Lund-Goldstein rang the bell 32 times.

U.S. Representative calls for change
One of Congress' most vocal critics of the Iraq war took the stage at Friday's May 4 Commemoration, calling for a change in American foreign policy and urging the American people to take action against the war in Iraq. "On May 4, 1970, a place whose mission is to create became a place of destruction.

An interview with the outspoken Noam Chomsky
Since the start of the Vietnam War, Noam Chomsky, an emeritus Institute Professor and Professor of Linguistics at MIT, has become increasingly popular with time. By 1992, the Arts and Humanities Citation Index declared him the most cited living person and the eighth most cited person of all time.

After son's death in Iraq, mother starts organization to end war
Rosemary Palmer, whose son, Edward "Augie" Schroeder, was killed in Iraq in August 2005, said Americans have a job to do: Take action to end the Iraq War and "as soon as possible, bring our soldiers home." "Every violent death tears a hole in the soul of the universe," she said.

Political activist: Multiple avenues of activism the way to stop war in Iraq
Political activist Tom Hayden said the time has come to "apply memory to the future" because the "past is a resource to understand where we're going." "The struggle for memories is a very important one for the beginning and end of any social movement," he said.

Kent Police Department has a peaceful May 4 weekend
It was a quiet weekend for the Kent Police Department with few arrests occurring. Though official numbers were not available at press time, Lt. Jayme Cole said there were about nine arrests Saturday night. "There were extra officers on staff, but there weren't any major problems," Cole said.

2007 Commemoration Headlines

CROWD ON THE COMMONS: Students dance to music from a local band near the main stage at the Rembrance Day gathering. [WKSU photo]

BELL TOLLS FOR VIRGINIA TECH: Kent State's Victory Bell rang 32 times at 9:45 a.m. May 1 in memory of those killed by a gunman last month in Blacksburg, Virginia. [WKSU photo]

Kent State ceremony honors Virginia Tech victims

The campus bell tolled Friday for two tragedies separated by a generation as Kent State memorialized its four dead at the hands of Ohio National Guardsmen and the 32 killed at Virginia Tech by a gunman.

The Kent State Victory Bell rang 32 times at midmorning for last month's victims of the Virginia Tech shooter, who took his own life, then rang again at midday for the annual commemoration of the May 4, 1970, shootings at the Ohio college.

The afternoon ceremony on the 37th anniversary of the Kent State shootings, which happened during a Vietnam-era war protest, had the feel of an anti-war rally as speakers denounced the U.S. war in Iraq and called for student activism to halt it.

"This has got to be a peace movement," said anti-war activist Cindy Sheehan {photo, below right], who choked up as she recounted the death of her son in Iraq. "What an honor it is to be welcomed into the Kent State family."

Fellow anti-war activist Tom Hayden urged students to lobby against the war.

The Virginia Tech commemoration was scheduled to coincide with the time of the second of two fatal attacks there April 16.

"I choked up. It's an emotional thing," said Sarah Lund-Goldstein [in photo], a Kent State senior and part of the campus group that organized the commemoration. "We feel it's very important to understand that a grieving campus is not just one from 37 years ago."

A crowd estimated by police at 200 to 300 sat on a sun-drenched, grassy hillside and heard speakers memorialize the Kent State students.

Mary Ann Vecchio, 51, of Miami, the subject of a Pulitzer Prize-winning photo showing her with arms outstretched over the body of shooting victim Jeffrey Miller, told the gathering her experience on the campus that the day in 1970 will always be with her.

"Time has passed. Time goes on. We miss you here today," she said, invoking Miller's memory. "I'll always be here at Kent for you."

A survivor, Alan Canfora, said this week that an analysis of static-filled audio from the 1970 campus shootings revealed a military order to open fire. It has long been a mystery what prompted the 13 seconds of gunfire.

After the shootings, the FBI concluded it could only speculate on whether an order was given to fire. One theory was that a Guardsman panicked or fired intentionally at a student and that others fired when they heard the shot. Eight Guardsmen were acquitted of federal civil rights charges.

Canfora, 58, one of nine students wounded in the shooting, located the tape in Yale University's archives about the event. He has called for new federal and state investigations.

::Associated Press 5/04/07

HEADLINE LINKS:

Kent State marks 1970 shootings

Kent State University in Ohio Friday marked the 37th anniversary of the day National Guardsmen shot and killed four students during a Vietnam War protest.

With anti-war activist Cindy Sheehan as the keynote speaker, events include a display of boots representing the number of lives lost in the Iraq War, the Daily Kent Stater reports.

In addition, the university library opened for public viewing an archival collection of letters and other materials dealing with the events that left four students dead and nine wounded.

Materials range from iconic photographs to the original FBI documents with J. Edgar Hoover's signature.

One letter from a group of French students has the letter "X" in President Richard Nixon's name replaced with a Nazi swastika.

Another written by Jonathan Pannor, 9, suggests the country would be better off without a National Guard.

::United Press International 5/04/07
::Photo: Associated Press 5/04/07

Upon his introduction to a packed and excited Kiva audience at Kent State University Thursday, author and peace activist Tom Hayden mused about how his Web site, www.tomhayden.com, was mentioned during his introduction. "They used to call me "Tom Hayden-dot-communist," he joked. [MORE]

:: Record-Courier 5/04/07

Why would the FBI assert that the newly-inaugurated governor of Ohio is "completely controlled"? Media sources like Life magazine noted the governor's alleged ties to organized crime and the Mafia in specific. [MORE]

::Counterpunch 5/04/07

Their faces went blank. "They still shootin' people?" one asked. [MORE]

::Mansfield News-Journal 4/27/07

Many who witnessed the shootings at Kent State University 37 years ago recall a flank of National Guardsmen turning in unison and then firing into the crowd. Were the soldiers following orders? The question has haunted recollections of that tragic day, four young people shot dead.

Now Alan Canfora has come forth with a copy of a tape recording (digitally enhanced), arguing the words ``Right here,'' ``Get set!'' ``Point!'' and ``Fire!'' can be heard. ``The evidence speaks for itself,'' Canfora declared this week. ``There was an order to fire.''

The trouble is, amid the static and high-pitched sounds, little can be detected with any certainty, let alone clear commands. Perhaps an independent assessment, aided by new technology and short of the federal investigation Canfora has proposed, is the avenue to answering this lingering question, for completing a portion of the historical record.

What should be recalled is how invested Canfora has become in that dreadful day, his penchant well-known for imagining conspiracies. Remember, too, that nothing of this kind has surfaced in all the examinations of the past, including court cases, though many have wondered about a silent command.

All these years later, it would be most valuable to learn what led to the gunfire (beyond the carelessness of James Rhodes, then the Ohio governor). It is doubtful that Alan Canfora has heard the truth.

::Akron Beacon Journal 5/03/07

“She never saw it, never knew it was coming. She was dead before she hit the ground. [MORE]

::Chicago Daily Herald 5/03/07

Thirty-seven years after Allison Krause, Jeffrey Miller, Sandra Scheuer and William Schroeder were killed near the spot, a historical marker recalling the May 4, 1970 shootings at Kent State University that resulted in their deaths and the wounding of nine other students was officially dedicated Wednesday.

The double-sided Ohio Historical Marker titled "Kent State University: May 4, 1970" was put in place recenlty in the shade of a tree between Taylor Hall, an academic building, and Prentice Hall, a dormitory. It was officially made a part of the KSU landscape Wednesday, with Tom Grace, Dean Kahler, Joe Lewis, Jim Russell and Alan Canfora, who were wounded in 1970, and numerous former and current KSU students, faculty and community members looking on.

Dr. Kathy Stafford, vice president for university relations and a senior at KSU in 1970, helped lead the committee that applied for the marker. She said the drive to get it installed began with an "eloquent" letter in 2005 from Grace to then-KSU president Carol Cartwright, seeking a "more permanent narrative in a very prominent place at the site" of the shootings.

Grace spoke Wednesday about how "Kent State not only belongs to Ohio but to the nation."

"We can read this plaque to gain a better understanding of our history," Grace said.

According to KSU President Lester Lefton, the marker "embraces the significance of how May 4 has seeped into the fabric of Kent State ... it brings to life the words inscribed on the May 4 memorial: Inquire. Learn. Reflect."

He said May 4, 1970 holds a significant place in the history of the state, and has been the catalyst for change at the university, leading to a focus on civil discourse, a model for the teaching of tolerance and diversity.

The marker contains information both on the buildup of the Vietnam War that led to protests, anti-war rallies and the burning of the campus ROTC building two days before the shootings.

Not everyone who listened to a recording of the National Guard opening fire on students protesting the Vietnam war at Kent State heard the same thing.

At a news conference in Kent, Ohio, Tuesday, Alan Canfora played a CD he said was copied from a reel-to-reel tape recorded by a student who placed a microphone out his dormitory window.

A New York Times correspondent said although there was a lot of static, it was possible to hear someone shout "Point"; Canfora claims the full sequence says: "Right here. Get set. Point. Fire."

The sound of 67 shots being fired over a 13-second period is then heard, during which four students were killed and nine others were wounded.

Kent State graduate and current KSU Associate Professor Carole Barbaro told the Cleveland Plain Dealer she hadn't heard the same things Canfora had at the news conference, but said it is important for Department of Justice officials to scrutinize it further.

"If the tape is verified, we can put the blame on the person who gave the order to shoot," she said.

Eight guardsmen were acquitted of charges in 1974.

::United Press International 5/02/07

May 2, 2007

I am a resident of Ohio and an alumnus of Kent State University. I was a junior when the Kent State Shootings occurred on May 4, 1970. The 11 p.m. News on WKYC-TV3 showed an alarming film segment of a student with a gun waving above his head and running toward a group of Campus Police/Ohio National Guardsmen. He was out of breath, but shouting that: "I had to shoot, I had to shoot".

The scene then switched to an ambulance arriving on campus. I knew who the student was with the gun. I called the FBI Office in Cleveland the next day and gave them a ton of information on illegal and unlawful activities this individual was involved in as a student/informant/photographer since 1968 at Kent State.

The FBI said they would get back to me -- they never did. Instead they concealed the informant's tracks thoroughly. The footage of the film with audio, as I described to the FBI disappeared and has yet to surface again -- anywhere.

As the case was pieced together by media and investigative authors, the FBI/Kent Campus Police informant was the probable catalyst of the Kent State shootings, according to student and National Guard witnesses.

After repeated requests to governmental sources asking the FBI to "come clean" on what they did as a result of my voluntary testimony to them on May 5, 1970, they have remained silent and so have all elected officials both federal and state. I have submitted packages of evidence, film, photographs, and testimonies to them regarding the FBI/informant/photographer and his grave actions on May 4th, but they will not even acknowledge the information that was sent to them including certified and registered mailings.

A friend of mine who is an attorney in the Akron, Ohio area got my package of indicting information and contacted two close friends who work for in the FBI. They personally got back to him within two weeks in January 2006 -- and they told him that the Kent State case is "buried deep, real deep."

Joseph M. Sima
North Olmsted, Ohio

BUZZFLASH: Four Dead in Ohio

By CINDY SHEEHAN
May 4, 2007 will be the 37th year since the Kent State, Ohio massacre where four anti-war protesters were killed by Ohio National Guardsmen during a protest against Richard Nixon's announced escalation in Vietnam.

On that day in 1970, anti-Vietnam war sentiment in the entire nation was high as hundreds of soldiers were coming home in flag-draped coffins every week and we were bombarded daily with images of burning villages and screaming Vietnamese children. The images were harsh, but what was even harsher was the Nixon regime escalating a war in a Johnsonian way when he had promised he would end the quagmire in Vietnam, if elected.

The Kent State protest rose spontaneously against Nixon's pronouncement. Anti-war sentiment was high on campuses all over America, and soldiers during that time were in full-blown mutiny and actively protest the war "in country" and here in the states. By 1970, there were a reported 209 "fragging" (lower rank soldiers killing their superiors in the field) and well over 55,000 deserters. A young Alabama Air National Guardsman named George W. Bush would soon add his name to the deserters when he failed to report for duty in 1972. It seemed like people from all demographics really cared enough to get out from behind their TV sets and out from behind the protection of their comfortable lives to join protests all over the country. [Click here for MORE]

::Buzzflash.com 5/02/07

Tape 'reveals order'
to shoot Vietnam protesters

>Click HERE for video of press conference announcing release of 'Get Set! Point! Fire!' audiotape.

By Suzanne Goldenberg in Washington
Wednesday May 2, 2007
Guardian (UK)

The command, as Alan Canfora heard it on a 37-year-old audio recording recently discovered in a government archive, appeared to leave no room for doubt. "Right here. Get set. Point. Fire." Then came 13 seconds of gunfire. When it ended, four students were dead and nine injured, and the shootings at Kent State University became engraved in America's collective memory as one of the most painful days of the Vietnam era.

Yesterday, Mr Canfora, pictured right, who was among the nine students wounded on that day, demanded a new investigation into the shootings at Kent State in Ohio, saying it was time to settle conclusively what led the contingent of National Guard troops to open fire on unarmed student protesters.

"There has been a 37-year cover-up at Kent State. The commanding officers have long denied there was a verbal command to fire. They put the blame on the triggermen," Mr Canfora told the Guardian.

He said he wants the FBI to use new technology to analyse the recording. He also said he planned to post an audio clip of the recording on two websites.

Mr Canfora, who was 21 years old at the time of the shootings, was barely 60 metres away from the Guards when they opened fire. He was shot in the wrist.

"They stopped, turned, raised the weapons, began to shoot and continued to shoot for 13 seconds," he said. "It was like a firing squad."

His life was transformed by the events that day. One of his friends was among the dead, and he has devoted much of his time over the last 37 years trying to bring the Ohio National Guard and the federal authorities to account for the killings.

The Guard has always claimed that no order was given to open fire, and there is speculation that the students were cut down after one of the troops panicked, triggering a volley of gunfire.

Although eight guardsmen were indicted, no one was ever prosecuted, and the episode exposed the deep disdain of the Nixon administration for dissenters. The families of the 13 killed and wounded pursued a civil suit against the state governor and the National Guard, which was eventually settled out of court.

The materials from that civil suit were eventually stored in the archives at Yale University, where Mr Canfora recently rediscovered a 30-minute recording of the protest.

The recording was made by a fellow student, Terry Strubbe, who placed an old-fashioned reel-to-reel tape recorder on the window sill of his dorm room, which overlooked the protests. Mr Strubbe, who has declined to speak to reporters, still has the original recording in a bank safety deposit box.

However, a spokesman for Mr Strubbe, Joseph Bendo, told the Guardian yesterday he was unsure whether there were sounds of an order to open fire on the original recording.

"It was never heard on our version of the tape, but maybe nobody ever listened. It's unusual that nobody has heard it before in 37 years. Other people have heard this tape in the past, and maybe they weren't listening for it," he said.

But the power of America's memories of that day are undeniable. Nearly two generations after the shootings at Kent State, it now seems unthinkable that the National Guard could ever use live ammunition against students.

The events of that day were relived endlessly in shocking images of teenagers crouching over the corpses of their fellow students in the US heartland. They also led to protests which radiated across the country, shutting down hundreds of college campuses, and forcing Richard Nixon to decamp Washington for Camp David.

CLICK ON RELATED STORIES:

"Although nothing will ever look or feel the same to those who were living, working and studying on the Virginia Tech campus four days ago — and nothing can bring back the precious and promise-filled lives that were lost — Kent State is a testament to the resilience of the human spirit and its capacity to create great good from great pain," Lefton said to the hundreds gathered in Risman Plaza.
:: DAILY KENT STATER, 4/20/07

EXCLUSIVE:

PROOF OF AN

ORDER TO FIRE

By Alan Canfora
NOTE: Unarmed anti-war Kent State University student Alan Canfora takes a stand against the Ohio National Guard on the Kent State campus on May 4, 1970, right, before being shot through the right wrist. [Photo: John Filo]

In recent months, while researching mountains of evidence for my two forthcoming May 4-related books, I was stunned to discover absolute corroborated proof of the verbal order to shoot and kill. In the five seconds before the 67 gunshots were fired, a National Guard commander shouted this verbal command at the top of Blanket Hill: "Right here! Set! Point! Fire!"

For daily online updates of supporting evidence leading to our imminent announcement, see: http://alancanfora.com/?q=node/38 and http://may4.org/?q=node/42. [Click here for MORE]

::ALAN CANFORA 4/19/07

"Raw History" Six one-hour episodes employing rare pictures, video and other information to uncover new insights into iconic events. Among the subjects the series will cover are Iwo Jima, the assassination attempt on President Ronald Reagan and the shooting at Kent State University. "You'll find the truth is more complex than the conventional wisdom," Michael Cascio, senior VP of special programming at NatGeo, said. The show is scheduled to air in the third quarter of 2007.
:: TVWEEK.COM, 4/16/07

37th Annual May 4th Commemoration