System. Thank you all so much for coming out tonight. Tonight we are hosting the photography for howard ruffner, who during his College Years i can say university, was a photographer for the yearbook as well as the newspaper. His book tonight, moment of truth is a collection of more than 150 of his photos that surround the kent state massacre of 1970, in which four students lives were lost. So without further ado, please welcome howard ruffner. Well, first of all, i have to say its nice to see familiar faces out here. Lots of people from pasadena village and relatives by my daughter is out here with her. My son in law. His parents are here. And its really kind of people from the area where i live. But most of all, ive got to thank my my wife for being here. My wife, laura, because shell just raise her hand. As most of you know, whenever you endeavor on a real good project, your spouse is the one who picks up the other stuff. And la kept me organized, kept me going and made sure i didnt lose too much of a focus of where i was going with this. So let me get started. The intention of my book is to let you know more about me. In the beginning, before i attended kent state. My introduction to photogs fee and then the rest of the story starts with when i enrolled at kent state in march of 1969. And ill give you a glimpse of the campus life i knew before may four than the rest of the book is about my photography and experience photographing the events on campus from may one through may 4th. Thats me in the photo standing next to my mom, looking up at my newest brother, rick. So thats really something that rick all. The cleveland press back in those days thought a family of six boys made a good Human Interest story. So they titled it sing a song of six pants. Yeah. And the son of photographer our home kept an image of us while i watched as a photographer came into our house, looked around and found a place to gather us all together. He positioned us and took the picture. The photo ran on the front page of the afternoon paper. The next day above the fold. Friends and neighbors couldnt wait to share this front page. We were famous, and this was 1953. Here we are, 24 year, 18 years later, we are now seven boys in eight years. My youngest brother, mick, is on the far left. He was still in high school. Three of us have been in the service to air force one army. Two more will be joining one air force and the other one of the navy. So it was about a year after high school when i enlisted in the air force. During my first two years as a writer in the information office, in waco, texas. I applied was accepted to a group called danfoss defense. The department of defense broadcast specialist course at fort benjamin harrison, indianapolis, indiana. During the eight weeks of broadcast journalism, we were taught how to write for tv news and incorporate news, film and slide and television broadcasts. After dinner was i was assigned to the American Forces philippines network. My duties included editing film. Running a Television Camera during our live news shows. And also broadcast. And this sharp my ability to quickly frame and choose pick compose pictures whether behind a Television Camera or a handheld 35 millimeter slr. My visual awareness was growing, and later i became the primary news director and got all all the shots at the station. So the base offered me lots of opportunity to take photographs of celebrities, celebrities who visit doing uso shows, many uso shows through the Clark Airbase with comedians, singers, movie stars, entertain the troops and families and the uso shows were on the way to vietnam. General benjamin oday was in this photograph, the highest ranking africanamerican u. S. Air force officer with bob hope upon his arrival at clark air base. Davis would later be asked to serve on the president s commission on campus unrest to investigate the shootings at kent state in 1970. Many of the photos i took then were used in our daily television show. So it was at Clark Airbase, where we got seriously involved and photography. This is where i bought my first nikon off camera and lenses. Now i had a professional camera. The hobby shop on the base was my escape from work. Next came printing my images. Here they really taught me how to make a really finished photograph. I had heard watching your own photo appear in developer was just like magic. I was now giving myself assignments and taking pictures daily and printing what i thought was good. After a while, the photo lab techs encouraged me to enter an air force photo competition. With their encouragement, i entered this photo, which won first place for portraiture. Another photo editor. I entered one third place for landscapes. Now, having completed in one, gave me a real sense of accomplishment, encouraged me to even get even better. So now that my photo card for now that my photography was taking off, so to speak, i decided to submit a recent photo i took to the news space newspaper. This was my First Published photograph. It ran with my credit and it took some planning to get exactly what i wanted. And now i feel that im beginning to really become more accomplished as a photographer. So now its march of 1969, and ive enrolled at Kent State University ready to pursue my degree in broadcast journalism. Spring on campus was a time for students to get out and play and enjoy college life beyond books. These students had been involved in anything as silly as a mud fight, probably since they were in elementary school. It seemed like a perfectly natural way to break the ice. Get to know your fellow classmates. This helped me realize that there was a lot more to college and just going to class and studying. While i was surprised by seeing this, it just reminded me that it was safe in a playful way to relieve the tensions of school. From what fights to dating, casual friday said not been invented yet. Few students for jeans and sneakers were for gym class. It was date night for a sly the family stone concert that spring. Sly arrived on stage with mutton chops, long hair in an outrageous hippie outfit. Students, however, were their best date night clothes. You know, they looked like theyre going to job interviews. Chance student conservative side was apparent at the concert. This was my First Student protest photograph. Up until now, school is pretty quiet as far as protests were concerned. Students had been working on signs and banners during the week and the morning of the antiwar march. It was thursday morning, october 1969. Students grabbed signs on a banner as they left the University Campus and headed to downtown kent to protest the vietnam war. And they did this on thursday because kent was a suitcase campus. A lot of students went home to akron or canton or nearby kent canton, ohio. It was the kind of school where friday afternoons, weekends, the campus was deserted. The woman standing behind the word l all is alison krauss. Ill tell you more about her later. The antiwar sentiment was on the minds of many kent students, especially the young men who knew they were deferred from the draft as long as they remained in school. This would change, however, on december first, that year, when the draft lottery was put into place. As a photographer on campus, other than this protest march, most of the protesting i heard was in the classrooms and the student union. The next large antiwar gathering wouldnt occur until may 1st, 1970, when 3 to 500 students would attend a rally to protest nixons expansion of the war. Vietnam war to cambodia. By the fall, the Antiwar Movement had grown off colleges campuses to the mall in d. C. For us from the daily kent state or to decided to drive to washington d. C. To join the antiwar protests on november 15th. Just a few weeks after our own homecoming. We arrived friday evening in time to watch people honoring the soldiers who had died in vietnam. That night, 18 of us slept in one room of a friends dorm. Our feet pointed in, in our heads out. The next morning, we headed to the mall and i was impressed by the size of the crowd and by their focus and steadfast just to be part of something. So big it would make the government take notice. Well, this was my first trip to washington, d. C. Everything was very new and exciting. The resentment of how familiar people of this continued war could be felt. As i moved my way through the crowd. Their determination to have their voices heard was deafening. With the us capitol, the background of these protesters demanded an end to the war. I needed to push my way through the crowds to find out where the march began. And after a lot of walking and nudging my way around, i came to the beginning of the parade. I stood in awe as i spotted Coretta Scott king and George Mcgovern at the front of the parade. I nudged my way through to get as close as i could and took my photos locked arm in arm. Mcgovern and king and others showed the strength or unity of their unity and commitment. And i was moved to be so close to such committed and important people who opposed the war. Now, its may 1st on campus. My first 1970 history graduate student, steve shroff urges a rally of about 300 to 500 students to understand the severity of nixons decision to invade cambodia. The nixon did this without the consent of congress, and according to Steve Sherriff nixon murdered the constitution. Therefore it was dead and needed to be buried. And with the constitution buried and the crowd beginning to leave, the grad students packed up and went on their way. But one last grad student sees this as an opportunity to speak to the dwindling crowd, to remind them how important the rally was, and that the discussion about the war needs to continue. And he urged students to return to the same place on june monday, may 4th. And this rally on may 1st took place between 12 noon and 1 00. And both students started leaving just before the lunch period ended. So after the rotc building was set on fire saturday evening, i set up late saturday night into sunday morning and watched as a National Guard took up positions on the campus. I had a surreal feeling as i observed the movement of the term troops. Where did they come from so quickly . How did they get here . What kind of trouble would happen when students arrive back on campus after the weekend. Well, students walked around the burned out rotc building sunday morning as a return to campus. A flimsy wooden fence had been erected. Well, they were gone. And National Guardsmen were posted at the building to keep gawkers forgetting, getting too close. The protesting at stop. There are no were no rumors of more protesting or more buildings being set on fire. Everything had quieted down. So why werent the National Guard leaving. Well, one reason was that around 10 a. M. On may third, Ohio Governor james rhodes and an entourage of officials arrived on campus. They were there to survey the damage on campus and to determine what they would do about student protesters. The governor was running for a u. S. Congressional senate seat and the election was may 5th, just a day later, two days away. And when i heard this, i realized this is viewing of the burned out rotc building was just likely a planned event to get Media Coverage so he could be splashed across the newspapers and tv around the state. He wanted to impress voters that he was the law and order candidate so they would send him to washington. They didnt. Just using streetlights in searchlight from helicopters. Sunday evening i took photos as students staged a sit in at the center of town. They wanted to hear from the mayor of kent and from University President robert white. They wanted to know what was happening, who was in charge, what was a National Guards exact role, where the town and school now under martial law and confusion, reigned all around. On may 4th, around 11 30 a. M. , students gathered on the comments to continue the rally of may 1st. I have adjusted this photo to allow specific students to stand out, and if you cant see it very well in the front row are the legs and arms of jeffrey miller, who is standing behind a female student. So this is jeffrey miller. He was a native of plainville, new york, where he was born in 1952. His right a dog as mary ann vecchio, gesturing to the guard. Shed become the most recognizable man. University student, protester, the most iconic photograph you remember is the day after the cheeseburger. 14 years old, a runaway from florida. There are two shaded individuals in the middle right of the photo. These students are carrying their books as they pass on the way to class. On the right is william schroeder. He was a native of cincinnati, ohio, where he was born in 1950. To his left is Sandy Scheuer. To compare. Sandy scheuer is a speech therapist, honor student, fully attentive, going to class. She was born in 1949 in youngstown, ohio. I watched a lot as a line of guards, students reached the crest of the hill and the guard continued to advance on them. On the right just under the pagoda is alison krauss. Again, thats the person i took a photograph of in 1960 leading the protest parts of the city. Alison krauss was a freshman honor student and she was born in cleveland in 1951, 51. And this photo was particularly difficult for we look at because i see her Holding Hands with the boyfriend very levine and i go back to 1969. Remember the original photograph i took of her and the banner that read bring all the troops home . So at this point, the guard seemed to have completed its objective. They were supposed to disperse the students from the crowd that gathered in front of taylor hall that i showed you earlier. Yet the guardsmen were still advancing. Now, what more did they need to accomplish . What was their real objective here . What they really wanted was for this all to end. So they could go home. So as the guard continued their marching, they reached the corner of taylor hall. I witnessed the group at the rear turn in unison. Some crouched down while others stood. Then the gunshots began. Of course, i thought they would be shooting blanks. I took a photograph as they turned and fired, and i stood there. Then a moment later, i thought to myself, i better get down anyway. I probably look like a good target with these cameras hanging around my neck. And back then the lenses were pretty long and we didnt have a little tiny lenses or cameras. So what i did is i swung my left arm around my camera, my camera bag, and mike went down onto my i went down to the ground and just as i was getting down, dropping to my knees, i heard a young woman scream, oh, my god, get down there using real bullets. Theyre shooting real bullets. I was 80 feet in front of the guard when they turned and fired. This. Photo shows the ground in front of taylor hall where the National Guard turned and fired. It does not show evidence of anything thrown at the guard or anything that they would have that would have put their lives in danger as they would later testify at the civil trials. And i show this because when you look at a photograph, sometimes you look at what the photographer intended for you to see and what an interest in the first photograph you see the the guns pointed in the air or the bayonet and people looking in. If i go back, youll see what i mean. And then when well talk about somebody, maybe youre not in the right spot. There was this photo here. The other go next to it, kind of getting close to looking at me in my direction. And i looked around from my crouched position. I spotted john cleary lying wounded to the ground just to my left and a little bit behind me. He was at the base of the metal sculpture in front of taylor hall. I couldnt tell if he was dead or alive. Cleary was lucky. He survived a shot of the chest. The first time i saw this photo was more than a week later on the cover of life magazine. Someone from life had called me a week before, about 2 a. M. To let me know they had chosen one of my photos from the may 15 for the may 15th cover because i sent unprocessed rolls of film to life in chicago. I had no idea how my film turned out or what my images looked like or what i had captured. I never knew exactly what the cover shot was. And till life hit the newsstands later that week and im sure some of you might remember this cover we got up here. So at the memorial site of the shootings, visitors see these engraved words as they enter the Memorial Plaza at kent state. If youve not belva morial or kent state recently and you have a chart where you will be getting there from here, but its a thing to see if you go there. The first word is inquirer. And as i wrote this memoir, i asked myself hundreds of questions about what truth my photographs really captured. Who was the blame for killing an unarmed students . What role did the students have where the guardians lives ever at risk . And was there in order to fire for the word learn. Shortly after the kent state shootings, i realized that kent protests and subsequent killings of subsequent killing of students precipitated the closing of colleges and universities around the country. I remember reading about this in the local paper and watched it on television news. It was later estimated that more than 4 Million Students got more than half the 2551 colleges and universities in the country went on strike during the week of may 4th in response. This is all in response to the kent state shootings, making it the largest student protests in history. Then the last word is reflect. I always have been open and willing to share my kent state photos and memories. I have given talks on Public Schools to all grade levels, College Classes and local community groups. However, my proudest moment happened in october of 2016. I told my story about the kent street tragedy and protest at Hanoi University, where i was invited to speak to 200 English Speaking graduate undergraduates. And this could never possible without the help from kent state international department. These youngsters that heard abou