"Kent State Massacre" Site (Kent, Ohio)

 university, shooting, NRHP - National Register of Historic Places

This is the area in which four students were shot and killed and another nine wounded by the Ohio National Guard on May 4th, 1970, during anti-Vietnam War demonstrations. Specifically the protest was against the American invasion of Cambodia which President Richard Nixon launched on April 25, and announced in a televised address five days later. Several of the victims were not participating in the protests and were simply walking to class. Eight of the 13 hit were 300 feet (the length of a football field) or more from the Guardsmen when they were shot. One wounded student was 750 feet away. An investigation found that 67 shots were fired in 13 seconds. Criminal charges against eight Guard members, who claimed self-defense, were dropped in 1974.

In 1999, at the urging of relatives of the four students killed, the university constructed memorials for each in the parking lot between Taylor and Prentice halls. Each of the memorials sits on the exact spot where the student died.