Volu m e II - Purdue University Calumet

had broken their promise to back off of campus and also apparently lied to the students by telling them that
White and Satrom would meet with them, which never happened.
At some point during the day on May 3, Allison Krause had seen that there was a flower in the barrel of
the rifle of one of the Guardsmen, and she stated that “flowers are better than bullets” (Bills, 1988, p. 13).
However, Michener stated that Krause had given the flower to the Guardsman and then she made that
statement (Michener, 1970). That demonstrated that despite Krause being opposed to the war and
protesting it, she was a good person and she did not want violence to occur. It also showed that she was a
peaceful protester. She definitely did not suspect that she would die from the bullets of the National Guard
the following day. The hatred and apathy towards the National Guard had increased during that day, as a
result of the purported lies and actions of the National Guard. This changed the objective and motives of the
students from protesting the expansion of the Vietnam War to protesting the National Guard being at Kent
State. This could have been what caused Allison Krause to take a more militant position in protesting and
made her consider tossing rocks at the National Guard.
May 4, 1970 is the day that the National Guard gunned down students at Kent State. The National
Guard was sleep deprived. At 7:45 a.m., the Education Building was shut down as the result of a threat to
bomb the building (U.S. President’s Commission on Campus Unrest, 1970). There was an enormous
misunderstanding about the hours that curfew would start, because Kent had a different curfew than Kent
State University. General Canterbury met with many important figures to discuss curfew hours, and they
decided that Kent State would have the same curfew as the rest of the city, which was from 8:00 p.m. to
6:00 a.m., which resulted in Mayor Satrom changing the curfew time (U.S. President’s Commission on
Campus Unrest, 1970).
There was supposed to be a gathering of students at noon, which was originally to protest the expansion
of the war in Vietnam, but now it focused on the desire to have the National Guard removed from KSU
property because the students were livid that the Guardsmen had lied to them about meeting with Satrom
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