Recorded statements of Paul Allan Schott and Dawn Geckler, conducted by the Commission on KSU Violence.

[Unknown Speaker]: ...and push it into this second position. Let’s go in second position. And then when you talk, you should be able to see this little dial here, flipping. And it looks like it’s turned down pretty low now, huh? The guy told me that it should be adjusted so that it was well up in the normal range, and just occasionally went over into the high. About like that, I think.

[Paul Allan Schott]: My name is Paul Allan Schott, Jr. Kent address 609 Franklin Avenue, Kent, Ohio. Phone number 678-0522. Home address is 4506 38th Street NW, Canton, Ohio. Home phone is 492-1238. I am a senior at Kent State University. I did not witness any events which took place on Friday, May 1st, or Saturday, May 2nd, Saturday.

I did see certain events which I wish to report to the committee, which I saw on Sunday, May 3rd, and Monday, May 4th. The first of which I saw–events which I saw, which I wish to report, took place on the morning of Sunday, May 3rd, and it took place on the Commons of the University campus. At this time, the National Guard was setting up boundaries, or defense lines, around the Commons, and there were perhaps 50 people altogether who were scattered around the entire periphery of the Commons which were–who were seeing–observing the burned-out ROTC building.

At this time, a student who was standing a few feet from me was–who was wearing an army fatigue jacket, without any insignias or markings of any type, most common on a campus, was approached by an officer, a captain in the National Guard, who was carrying a long walking stick with him, perhaps, I don’t know, 3 feet to 42 inches–3, 3 and a half feet long. It had a big knot on the one end of it. He tapped the student on the shoulder and asked him to come with him. They proceeded out, perhaps, I don’t know, a few feet away from the people who were there. And he proceeded to ask the student if he’d ever been in the army, if he was going in the army, and where he had gotten the jacket from.

All this time he was doing this, he kept poking him with the walking stick, and he concluded by saying, “Look, we’re a clean-cut bunch of people and we don’t like degenerates like you wearing our clothes.” That was the end. The student returned. I say this, perhaps, not for the reason of placing guilt, but of perhaps emphasizing, or just making the statement, showing, perhaps, what type of an attitude was there on the part of other people, besides students.

Second events which I witnessed were around–sometime around 11–between 11 and 12 o’clock, on Sunday, May 3rd. This time, I was observing around a group of perhaps 60 to 75 students who were sitting in the street on Main Street, Route 5, just in front of the Robin Hood Inn and the UCF House. At this time, the National Guard had formed a line running from the library down to the town gas station, across Route 5, and the police had formed in basically an L-shape and were grouped en masse somewhere in a line running from the Capt’n Brady’s restaurant to the burned-out Gate House across to the Robin Hood Inn.

At this time, the students were asked to leave and the students wanted someone to come down and talk with them. So, the authorities stated that they would get the mayor to come down and talk with the students, and they would try to get President White to come down and talk with the students. The students said that under these conditions they would leave if the National Guard were removed from the campus and that line which I had mentioned before, which ran from on the campus up to the library.

A few moments passed. There was general talking among the crowd, at which time, someone came up with the public address system and made the announcement that the Guard had just been given the order to move off campus. At this time, the crowd got up, started to move back, they cheered. They moved back towards campus, and when they did, the Guard and the police closed their ranks and told everyone to get back to their dormitories or they’d be arrested. Then, they proceeded to move in this basic U-formation somewhat, in a line between Lincoln Street and the library, and up through–past Kent Hall and so forth, until they’d managed to force all the students back towards Taylor Tower.

And I mention this not for the purpose of blaming guilt on students or Guard, or innocence on either of them also, but perhaps to explain some of the antagonism which resulted on the part of the students toward the National Guard because of this particular action by the authorities. The idea being that the screams running through the crowd were, “Look, you can’t trust them, they won’t talk to us,” which further reinforced the conviction that most of them had that you couldn’t trust anyone in the police, or the National Guard, or the establishment, or whatever you want to call it. It just reinforced these views and antagonized students.

The next events which I witnessed took place on May 4th, Monday, around 12 noon, between 12 and 12:30. At this time, I was on the one side of the Commons along the tennis courts. When I arrived, the National Guard had just begun to move out and to fire tear gas to disperse the crowd, which had gathered around the Victory Bell at the Taylor Hall end of the Commons. I saw a group of less than 100 men, anyway, proceed up the hill between Taylor and Johnson, and once they reached the top of the hill I did not see them again until I saw them at the bottom of the hill on the other side on the practice football field, because I moved from the location near the tennis courts up to in front of Taylor Hall, near the southwest corner.

At this time, I witnessed–or saw–the National Guard, along the football–on the football field, and the students formed around on an arch, or semi-circle around them, going from the Prentice Hall, all the way around the Taylor Hall hill area, around down the other side. National Guard regrouped down at the bottom because people were throwing stones. They regrouped, they aimed tear gas towards–in the path which they’d just come from. They shot tear gas into the crowd there, and the crowd would throw it back. And they shot no more than four canisters–or not more than four canisters of tear gas, at which time they stopped and never fired any more as they proceeded up the hill. They started their march toward the hill between Taylor and Johnson in a very deliberate, organized fashion.

As they moved up the hill, the students split so as to let them go through. They then re-formed behind them and as they neared the top of the hill the students were perhaps 30 and 40 feet behind them. Some 20 students, perhaps in the front of the crowd, were running out and throwing stones at the Guard. As they neared the top of the hill, it seemed that the pace of the National Guard quickened somewhat, as the intensity of the stoning perhaps increased also. Just as they reached the top of the hill, they stopped, they turned, I saw a man with a sidearm draw it from his holster, aim it into the crowd, and fire.

At the same time, simultaneous with, and no pause between this, the rest of the Guardsmen also fired. I saw some Guardsmen who fired directly into the crowd, I saw Guardsmen who were obviously firing over the heads of students, and I could see Guardsmen, who, obviously, because of the position of their rifles, did not fire at all. And then students immediately–when the Guard had turned, the students stopped, and when the first shot was fired–or shots–they turned and ran.

The firing lasted perhaps 10 seconds or so, and during this time, I heard no order given to fire or to cease firing. I could not tell whether there was an order or not being given, because of the noise which was in the crowd between where I was standing and the National Guard, because at this time I was standing on the porch of Taylor Hall there, right in front of the doorway, nearest the southwest corner. And this is basically what I saw. The Guard did not, from what I could tell, re-advance toward, down the hill, back again, at the students, but they just retired down the other side.

[recording resumes after a short break]

[Unknown Speaker]: Okay, go ahead.

[Unknown Speaker]: Wait, did you press the red button?

[Unknown Speaker]: Yes, she pressed it. [unintelligible] Good luck!

[Dawn Geckler]: My name is Dawn Geckler, and I live at 718 College Towers in Kent. My phone number is 678-1395, and I can best be reached probably at my home in Canton, Ohio, and my phone number there is 832-5935.

Actually, on that fatal day I did not see what I–my vantage point was not that great. I had walked up to go to the Chestnut League, which has it’s office in Johnson Hall–or underneath, the Student Activities–and I was walking up when I heard what sounded like firecrackers, but when I saw the Guards, I came up from behind them. I thought they were just firing blanks because I saw a lot of kids running and I thought they were just trying to disperse the crowd by just scaring them.

So, I really was not cognizant of what was going on. I did not see much, and I guess I just came here just kind of to talk and just kind of to say how I feel about it. It really was kind of weird because, like I said, I thought they were blanks until I saw blood. And, it was such a weird feeling to see that, especially after you just thought people–you just thought that people were just falling because of the fact they thought they were bullets, and I thought they were blanks. And then I thought that a lot of the kids were just shot to be wounded. And then when I heard four dead, it kind of shocked me even more.

[recording continues after a short break]

I guess that’s really all I have to say, other than I think the whole thing was ridiculous, and I honestly wish I–not the fact that it’s a big picnic or anything, but I honestly wish that I could have had a more objective view of what was going on. Coming from behind the way I did, seeing the Guards advance over the hill, I was not at a good vantage point to make any real, definite statement as to what happened. I did not hear one shot fire out. As I came towards the scene, I heard many shots, so I really cannot say anything valid towards if that–

[recording ends abruptly]