Tolling of Bell Marks Shootings at Kent State
As thousands of people watched, a bell tolled on the Kent State University campus Thursday at 12:24 p.m., marking the exact moment National Guardsmen opened fire 30 years ago on antiwar protesters.
The Victory Bell sounded 15 times: once each for the four students killed and nine wounded at Kent State and once each for two students killed at Jackson State University in Mississippi 10 days later.
The shootings on May 4, 1970, stunned the nation and galvanized the antiwar movement.
The 30th anniversary brought the nine who had been wounded back to the campus for the first time since the shootings.
“We don’t know why this happened to us. We don’t know who said, ‘Shoot.’ We don’t know when they said it or why,” said Joseph Lewis, now 48 and living in Oregon.
A candlelight march began on the anniversary’s eve and continued with an overnight vigil at the parking lot where Allison Krause, Sandy Scheuer, Jeffery Miller and William Schroeder were killed.
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