May 4 Birthday
On May 4, 1970, the Ohio National Guard fired sixty-seven rounds in thirteen seconds at a crowd of students at Kent State University. Four students were killed, nine were wounded. The Guard had been called to the campus after demonstrations against the Vietnam War. A truck burned and a building's windows were broken. The Guard advanced with tear gas; some students threw rocks. Then the Guard fired. Two of the four killed — Allison Krause and Jeffrey Miller — were walking to class. The Guardsmen claimed they were under attack; photographs show no evidence of an imminent threat. Neil Young wrote "Ohio" after seeing the photographs in Life magazine. The song was recorded and released in ten days. "Tin soldiers and Nixon coming / We're finally on our own." The Haymarket affair occurred on May 4, 1886, in Chicago. A labor rally in Haymarket Square had been called to protest the killing of a striker by police. The rally was peaceful and was winding down when 176 police advanced to disperse the crowd. Someone threw a bomb — a pipe bomb filled with dynamite — into the police line. It killed seven officers. The police opened fire on the crowd, killing several civilians. The identity of the bomber was never established. Eight anarchists were tried for conspiracy; the evidence was their writings and speeches, not their actions. Four were hanged. May Day, the international workers' holiday, commemorates the Haymarket martyrs. Margaret Thatcher became Prime Minister on May 4, 1979, at the head of a Conservative government that had been out of power for five years. She was the first woman to lead a major Western democracy. Her policies — privatization, deregulation, anti-union legislation — reshaped British society and inspired similar reforms in the United States under Reagan. She was loved and hated with equal intensity. She won three elections, survived an IRA bombing of her hotel in Brighton, and was forced out by her own party in 1990. She died in 2013, and her funeral was attended by the Queen — only the second Thatcher PM funeral she had attended. Audrey Hepburn, born this day in 1929, survived the Dutch famine of 1944 by eating tulip bulbs. She was fluent in five languages. Her first major role was in Roman Holiday (1953), for which she won an Oscar. Her Givenchy-designed wardrobe defined an aesthetic of understated elegance. She spent her later years working for UNICEF. People born on May 4 fall under the zodiac sign of Taurus. The birthstone is Emerald and the birth flower is Lily of the Valley. Historical events on May 4 include 1886: Haymarket affair — bomb kills seven police at labor protest in Chicago, 1970: Ohio National Guard fires on Kent State students, killing four, 1979: Margaret Thatcher becomes first female Prime Minister of the United Kingdom. Famous people born on May 4 include Audrey Hepburn (1929), Willie Mays (1931), George Will (1941).