National Guardsmen at Kent State, 1970, Kent State University
|
In the late 60s, the United States was engaged in the Vietnam War, a conflict that was quickly becoming unpopular due to a rising number of American casualties. When President Nixon announced a need to draft 150,000 more troops on April 30, 1970, protests broke out on college campuses across the nation. When protesters at Kent State set fire to the ROTC building, the governor of Ohio deployed 900 national guardsmen. On May 4th, twenty-eight guardsmen opened fire on a crowd of unarmed protesters, killing four and wounding nine. The killings intensified protests across the country and gave further fuel to the anti-war movement. Protests spread to almost 500 different colleges in the days after the massacre.
|
Sources to Get Started |
|