After all this blather, let’s get down to the facts.
Stang’s article about the May 4, 1970 shooting of 13 students by Ohio National Guardsmen at Kent State University during an anti-war rally is very inaccurate and misleading.
Stang claims there was a sniper that fired at the Guardsmen, but he is simply wrong. First and foremost, I have been to Kent State University and have seen the bullet hole in the metal sculpture that Stang references. The hole is larger on the student side of the sculpture.
This obviously means that the bullet came from the Guard, hit the sculpture and expanded the hole on the way out. Also, his claims that there was a “riot,” and that the students were “surging” up the hill toward the Guardsmen, was completely disproven by photos that were taken. (That was early inaccurate info; Stang was very dishonest in quoting such bogus misinformation.) The students were scattered and at a great distance—typically hundreds of feet away.
(Interestingly, too, Stang had a photo in which he looked through the hole to a building where he claims the sniper was. He couldn’t even get the name of the building right. He said it was Prentice Hall, when the picture actually shows Dunbar Hall.)
Secondly, most of the Guardsmen, didn’t even fire at all! Of the 76 Guardsmen present, only about 23 fired. And of those 23 most of them fired in the air. That is why only seven were indicted.
Thirdly, NONE of the Guardsmen who fired said they shot at a sniper. They actually fired over a broad area. And one Guardsman, Lawrence Shafer, even admitted he shot at a student who gave him “the finger.” (New York Times, Nov. 7, 1974, p. 51)
Fourthly, during the later 1979 civil trial of the Guardsmen, the engineering firm of Bolt, Berenek and Newman was hired to analyze the recording of the shots. They proved conclusively that all shots came from the Guard, contrary to Stang’s claim that the first shot came from a sniper.
It is a shame that the seven Guardsmen were not convicted of manslaughter at the very least.
For the facts in more detail and not Stang’s nonsense, I highly recommend:
The Truth About Kent State by Peter Davies, and The Kent State Coverup by Joseph Kelner and James Munves
Interesting how Kent State has been brought up with regard to the WACO motorcycle shooting. I was watching the pilot episode of “Aquarius” - new TV show about the sixties and Charles Manson with David Duchovney. Conflict between the people, and the blacks and the “pigs” and rights, etc.
I suppose that is an age-old story that will never be resolved good enough for everyone’s satisfaction.
Also interesting is the swing in Conservative thinking regarding the police. Kent state it was “they should have killed all them damn hippies”. Now it is “They ambushed those bikers”.
I’m guessing the truth is somewhere in the middle for both events. And of course I believe that in both cases there were violent instigators, and the majority of folks are just along for the ride.