By: Christina Cowan

Christina Cowan
Mon, 04 May 2020 16:27:13 +0000

I was there, too. Caught a face and lungfull of pepper gas over at Robbie Lab (!) when the National Guard around the Admin Building three blocks away fired it at students who were changing classes at 8:50. (Apparently there was a rumor that students were going to try and take over the Admin Building – ringed by the National Guard – at 9 AM. And nobody said anything about how classes normally changed at 10 minutes before the hour.)

And a guy in my advanced French class was shot in the elbow as he was running away from the other side of the Oval from the Admin building. he and another guy from class, a Vietnam vet , were just watching . Which was when the vet said he recognized a familiar noise whizzing by his ear (a bullet) and decided they had better get out of there. As they ran away, the first guy was shot.

To put the politics here in perspective, was it 1968 or 1970 that Ohio State beat Michigan and there was a riot afterwards? A goal post got pulled down – one upright wound up and the second floor of teh Student Union and one got carried down to the Ohio State Capitol Building 5 or so miles away. And every business on High Street had its windows broken and some were looted. I was friendly with one woman, who had a small dishes and curios shop about a block down from the Student Union. She was just heartbroken STUDENTS did this to her.

I remember saying at the time that, had this been a political protest, people would have been shot.

Reason I am talking about this – well, it was FOOTBALL! So was anybody shot? Was anybody beaten up by cops? Was anybody even tear-gassed?

Nope. A lot more violent than the political protests and a lot more damage was done, but of course FOOTBALL. So it was all right. Fifty-odd years later and I am still disgusted.

The only funny thing about the whole demonstrations was hearing students calling the National Guard “draft-dodgers.” Which of course they were – that’s why guys with pull joined the National Guard back then, right, Dubya?