Wednesday, May 04, 2005

35 years ago today


'Ohio' . . .

Tin soldiers and Nixon coming,
We're finally on our own.
This summer I hear the drumming,
Four dead in Ohio.

Gotta get down to it
Soldiers are cutting us down
Should have been done long ago.
What if you knew her
And found her dead on the ground
How can you run when you know?

1970 neil young
(by crosby, stills, nash and young)



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4 Kent State Students Killed by Troops

8 Hurt as Shooting Follows Reported Sniping at Rally

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the search for historical accuracy
actual new york times report for may 4, 1970
today's memorial

(m.a. thanks a.g. for this sobering reminder . . . )

ohio (buy it)

2 comments:

Anonymous said...

David Crosby discussed the tragedy in a 1977 interview, "I think we react just as you do. When you saw the picture of the girl kneeling over the kid dead on the ground after Kent State, you were horrified, right? You said, how can they shoot somebody's child for doing what the Constitution says they have the right to do? How can they do that? How can this happen? Well, we feel the same way..."

The liner notes to Neil Young's 1977 Decade album state, "It's still hard to believe I had to write this song. It's ironic that I capitalized on the death of these American students. Probably the most important lesson ever learned at an American place of learning. David Crosby cried after this take."


At Tulane University, where I went be educated, there was a similar protest. In retaliation, Tulane Green Wave football coach Jim Pittman sent the football team into the Tulane Quad to beat up on any and all long haired protesters.

Together with the N.O.P.D. and the Tulane campus security. the "Greenies" swept the quad, hammering and beating on anything that stood in their way.

Why?

Because in those days, to play football at Tulane, being in the Army R.O.T.C. was MANDATORY. And that meant ALL the football team was R.O.T.C.

Is it any wonder that the Tulane R.O.T.C. building "mysteriously" burned to the ground later that night?

Or that 1970 was Pittman's last year at Tulane?


agp

sleepybomb said...

thanks for that . . .
i was 13 when this went down, i had a lot of nothing on my mind then. but i remember the thought of my government killing our own.
and thanks for the reminder of jackson state . . . i am sorry i didn't mention that too. . . so much sorrow, so little time . . .