Kent State to Hold Virtual May 4 Commemoration, Honor Wounded Students

In keeping with the commitment to honor and remember the events of May 4, 1970, Kent State University will hold a virtual May 4 51st Commemoration this year. On May 4, 1970, the Ohio National Guard fired on Kent State students during an anti-war protest, killing four students and wounding nine other students. Due to the global pandemic, the May 4 Commemoration and Candlelight Vigil will again be virtual.

The virtual commemoration will feature a video premiering at noon on Tuesday, May 4, that focuses on the nine wounded students: Alan Canfora, John Cleary, Thomas Grace, Dean Kahler, Joseph Lewis, Donald Mackenzie, James Russell, Robert Stamps and Douglas Wrentmore. The video will feature the new markers that have been installed on the May 4 site to indicate where wounded students were located when hit by gunfire.
 
These new markers join the existing four markers that were installed in 1999 in remembrance of Allison Krause, Jeffrey Miller, Sandra Scheuer and William Schroeder, the four students killed on May 4, 1970. The new markers for the wounded students display the names of the students and their distance from the Ohio National Guard.
 
The virtual commemoration will also remember and recognize Alan Canfora, who died in December 2020 at the age of 71. Over the past 50 years, Canfora was the primary voice of May 4, never allowing the shootings and the four killed to be forgotten. To honor his life and legacy, the Alan Canfora Activism Scholarship has been created.
 
“We are committed to the legacy of May 4, 1970, sharing the lessons learned and the importance of this date in history,” said Kent State President Todd Diacon. “We remember and honor those who were lost and those whose lives were never the same. The impact of May 4 reverberates beyond our campus, reaching those across the country and around the world.”

At 7 p.m. on Monday, April 5, the university will host a special virtual screening of “Fire in the Heartland: Kent State, May 4 and Student Protest in America,” a film by Daniel Miller. The screening will be followed by a virtual panel discussion with Chic Canfora, a May 4 witness; Tiera Moore, student body president for Kent State’s Undergraduate Student Government; and Ethan Lower, director of governmental affairs for Undergraduate Student Government. The virtual screening event is open to all Kent State students, faculty and staff, and attendees can preregister at https://zoom.us/webinar/register/WN_E30nx9n5SHmRtmIPzElpDQ. 

To watch the virtual commemoration, learn more about the candlelight vigil and find future updates on additional programming for this year’s commemoration, visit www.kent.edu/may-4-1970.
 

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Media Contacts:
Eric Mansfield, emansfie@kent.edu, 330-672-2797
Emily Vincent, evincen2@kent.edu, 330-672-8595