Judith Frohlich, Oral History

Recorded: May 5, 2015

Interviewed by: Lae’l Hughes-Watkins

Transcribed by: The Kent State University Research and Evaluation Bureau

Note: This transcript includes geo-references to locations that are discussed in the oral history. Geographical names linked in the transcript will open in a new window or tab that takes you to that location information and map in the Mapping May 4 project. To request a transcript without geo-reference links included, please contact Kent State University Special Collections & Archives.

[Interviewer]: This is Lae’l Hughes-Watkins speaking on May 5th, 2015 at Kent State University’s Special Collections and Archives as part of the May 4th Oral History Project. I will be talking with Judith Frohlich. I would like to begin with some biographical questions. First where were you born?

[Judith Frohlich]: I was born in Cleveland.

[Interviewer]: And where did you grow up?

[Judith Frohlich]: Well I grew up my whole life, actually, in Cleveland, Ohio.

[Interviewer]: And what brought you to Kent State University, or what was your experience to having connected to Kent State University?

[Judith Frohlich]: Well, in high school I was President of Future Teachers of America and I had always heard that Kent, out of all the very fine state teachers—well state colleges in Ohio, Kent had one of the best education schools and had a very fine teachers’ prep program, and since I had known I wanted to be a teacher from the time I was a very little girl, I liked to write with chalk on the blackboard, I really started to look toward Kent. So I was, you know, I applied to 2 or 3 of the state schools but I really wanted to go to Kent, I visited the campus when I was fairly young. I thought the drive was pretty from Cleveland, of course there weren’t very many highways back then. But I really—I set my sights on Kent very early on.

[Interviewer]: So, what was your official major as a student at Kent State?

[Judith Frohlich]: It started out as education, it remained education, as I said, and yeah, I was in teacher prep all along. And my master’s was also in education with, actually, I became a reading specialist.

[Interviewer]: What year did you exactly come to Kent State University?

[Judith Frohlich]: I started in 1963.

[Interviewer]: So, during your time at Kent State, were you, yourself, politically active?

[Judith Frohlich]: I would say that, you know, of course in today’s terms, I guess I would be a progressive. Back in the day I was always of a, sort of a liberal bend I would say, but I was not part of Students for Democratic Society, uh no. I just supported liberal causes, I think I did attend a few rallies but I wasn’t marching down Main Street or anything of that sort. No.

[Interviewer]: Did you have a specific feeling about the Vietnam War at that time, though?

[Judith Frohlich]: Yes, I was very much against the war. I was brought up by a dad who always taught me to think for myself and taught me to ask questions about things, so, I did not approve of the war. I remember I did take some political science classes as electives because I found them interesting, I had some good professors who taught me to think for myself. I had, I remember, a great, young, poli-sci professor who had gone to march at Selma, and, he told us about that, and you know, so I believed in all these causes very much so. And I supported, back in the day, all the civil rights causes and even though people didn’t talk about it as much at that time, gay rights, and all the things that we now, unfortunately we’re still talking about these things.

[Interviewer]: So that’s a great segue, going back to your professor, his time in Selma. Can you recall the environment in your classes in general and prevailing attitudes of your classmates?

[Judith Frohlich]: I would say that, you know, I would say that more people, I think, at Kent, were—I don’t know how to phrase this exactly and I don’t know if Ken would agree with me, but my feeling was that more people were sort of middle-of-the-road. I didn’t—it didn’t strike me that there were people who, what we would now term, you know, ultra conservative at that time. There were not many people who were outspoken, you know, very liberal, very left wing, at all. There were people that were sort of uninvolved, almost apathetic; Kent was not a very political campus at all, the way I saw it. So, everything that happened on May 4th and leading up to May 4th was actually fairly surprising. And when we had friends who were at Stanford or the University of Chicago or places that were far more active, they were just shocked, shocked that things happened the way they did at Kent State.

[Interviewer]: So, you said you arrived at Kent State in the early Sixties, when did you, or how long were you at Kent State as a student?

[Judith Frohlich]: Well, I don’t know if Ken told you our history, but I was at Kent continuously. I graduated in ’67, and we actually got married one week after graduation. And, so, I started teaching in Hudson the fall after graduation and immediately started going to graduate school as well. And Ken started his graduate work—Ken was already, actually, in graduate school at that time. And he had been going to what is now Carnegie Mellon—at the time it was Carnegie Tech in Pittsburgh. But was very unhappy there because he was a math student and their program was quite technical. So I introduced him to a professor that I actually met through my sister and they were looking for graduate students—Kent’s PhD program was fairly new at that time and they were looking for PhD candidates in the math and the statistics program, and so he ended up transferring to Kent right after we got married and he did actually continue on with his doctorate at Kent, so we moved into Married Student Housing, which we actually visited this last year when we stopped and saw the memorial for the first time. So, we were at Kent then, living in Married Student [Housing] from ‘67 through—I finished my masters, he went on to get his doctorate and we left in—was it ’71?

[Kenneth Frohlich] [speaking in the background]: In ’71, we moved to Akron Boulevard, but we still lived in Kent.

[Judith Frohlich]: So, you weren’t yet finished with your doctorate. So, we’re still in Kent. So, we left in ’71.

[Kenneth Frohlich]: We left Married Student Housing in ’71.

[Judith Frohlich]: I’m talking about when we left the university. Was it ’71?

[Kenneth Frohlich]: ’72.

[Judith Frohlich]: So, we left the university in ’72, that’s when Ken completed his doctorate. Or that was just after he completed his doctorate. And he, at that time, I don’t know if he told you, but he got a letter from the university, he had been an instructor and by then we had our first son and he got a letter from the university saying that he got a promotion from instructor to assistant professor and the university held him in great esteem, and that’s what the promotion meant, but there were no funds to go along with the promotion because all the money was being spent on additional campus security because obviously Kent was a wild, crazy, terrible place where people got killed and terrible things happened.

So, there was no more money to be had. And for professors, and after all at a university, why should you pay professors any more money. So that was a little bit discouraging as we now had a child and we can’t pay MasterCard or Visa with esteem, which is what the university was offering him, more esteem. So, we actually left the university and Ken took a corporate job in Hartford, Connecticut. And the first time we were back at Kent was last year.

[Interviewer]: Well I do want to back up a little bit, if you could recall your personal experiences in the days leading up to May 4, so that time when the invasion to Cambodia was announced on April 30th, and then leading up to May 4, if you can recall your experiences at that time.

[Judith Frohlich]: Okay, well what I will tell you is that I was not involved in any campus demonstrations whatsoever because I was teaching full time in Hudson, Ohio. I was a fourth grade teacher there at McDowell Elementary School, beautiful brand-new school. And, I, you know, was just, like Ken we were watching television, we were, you know, trying to keep up on what was going on. Ken was going back and forth from our little married students’ apartment and he was on campus part-time, working at home, you know, on his studies part time, was teaching some classes, as I said. You know, busy back and forth.

I was saying to him, “I want you to be very careful,” because I forget how many days before the actual shootings, but I do know the National Guard was on campus for some days before the shooting. I think it was about four days, or two days. Three or four, two, whatever. But there were a few days before the shooting that the National Guard was on campus and they had weapons. So, I was admonishing him to be very careful about being around these young soldiers with the guns. And they did, they all looked very young. In fact, one of their tanks was in the parking lot of Married Student Housing, which also made me nervous.

But I got up early and went to my school every day, which I think Hudson was about—I’m trying to remember, eight or nine miles from Kent. Nice little town, eight or nine miles from Kent. And, so, I can’t tell you about any of the campus rallies or meetings or the prohibition of rallies, or students being in defiance of that. I learned quite a bit more much after the fact when Ken and I attended the hearings on campus unrest when they, when that commission toured around the country and we attended all three days of those hearing when they were at Kent, we sat in on all three days of those hearings. I sat and I listened to all the things that they were questioning, the Ohio National Guard generals about, but I did not personally witness any of the things that happened. I can tell you on the day of the shootings what transpired for me personally.

[Interviewer]: Yes, please continue.

[Judith Frohlich]: Well, I went to school and the—you know, there were—things seemed to be very tense because I think that—Ken, was it the day before that there had been the fire? Wasn’t there something that had been burned the day before?

[Kenneth Frohlich]: The ROTC building.

[Judith Frohlich]: There had been a building burned two days before, I think, and so the National Guard presence seemed to be more than ever. Just—they were all over the campus and all over the place and I was glad, actually, to leave town. I remember Ken said he was going to be on campus that day, and I said, “Please, can’t you just skip your class?” “No, no, I have to be there to teach.” And I said, “I really wish you wouldn’t go.”

And then in the lunch room, maybe, I don’t know what time I was having lunch, but it was sometime after twelve o'clock, one of the teachers came in from the school office and she said, “People—” she said, “Oh my god, they’re going crazy at Kent.” I said, “What do you mean?” And there were maybe six or eight of us sitting around a big table having lunch and she said, “The kids at Kent State went crazy and started throwing things and rioting,” and she said, “The National Guard was shooting at the crowd to get them to calm down and some people got killed.” I said, “What, what!?” Because I knew Ken had been on campus that day, so I just—I panicked and, you know, no cellphones, no cellphones, I could hardly call him and check. But I knew he had gone to campus that day, so I really, really got upset. I ran in to my principal and I said, “My husband’s on campus.” And he said, “Oh, I’m sure he’s fine.” I said, “How could you say that? They’re shooting. She said they announced that they shot into the crowd, and I know my husband was on campus, and, you know, he’s right by that area!” Oh, I was just a mess but I stayed to the end of the day, and when I went to drive home, I didn’t know that, by that time, which I guess was maybe between three thirty, maybe a quarter to four, probably closer to quarter to four ‘til all our students got on the bus.

There were—all the roads to Kent were blocked. I’m coming from Hudson a few miles away and you know, the car got stopped and I was asked, “Where are you going?” I said, you know, “I live on campus, I’m in Married Student Housing.” And, by the way, we were the only ones allowed to stay on campus when they emptied out the whole campus. I said, “I have to get home, I have to get to my husband.” So, this National Guardsman said, “Well, you’re going to have to get a police pass to get back to your apartment because there’s going to be checkpoints just about every block from here to your apartment.” And I had probably a couple more miles to go, this was at the beginning of the town. So, he wrote out a pass for me, and he said, “Before you can leave the town tomorrow morning, you’re going to have to get a pass from the chief of police.” So, he said, “You better get that,” and I said, “How am I going to find the chief of police?” He said, “I don’t know, but you better go to the police station.”

So, what I had to do before the five o’clock curfew is, once I got home, and I did, I got stopped about three more times, and I shared this thing that the Guardsman had given me, and they let me go, and I found Ken, and then he came back with me. We went into a police station and they gave me a police pass, which, by the way, I must’ve carried in my wallet, I must’ve carried it ‘til it shredded. And then I just—I finally, I don’t know, I threw it away or I lost it or something. But I must’ve carried it for about 15 years or 20 years. I carried it for such a long time. Because, I mean, I couldn’t get in and out of the city without this police pass to go back and forth, the days that Kent was under Martial Law. So, it was pretty hairy for those days. I think it lasted for about a week. Ken, was it about a week?

[Kenneth Frohlich]: I don’t remember how long it was.

[Judith Frohlich]: I think it was about a week, or five—I think it was a week, but I’m not sure if my memory is serving correctly. And then I think by sometime later that night, the campus had pretty much been emptied and I think I walked in the room as Ken was telling me that sometime—we stayed up, we watched on television some of the Cleveland newscasters talking about what had happened and how they had shot into an unarmed crowd. We were just horrified. Horrified. I mean, just—you know, stunned. Stunned, stunned. We just couldn’t believe what had happened. And then in the middle of the night, you know, there was a knocking on the door and we sat up and we were terrified. We were terrified. I know it sounds so bizarre, but, I don’t know if Ken told you this, but we thought it was a National Guard coming to take us away. We never for an instant thought it could be a neighbor or another student, we just assumed that they were coming for us, because that’s how frightened we were.

[Interviewer]: Did you ever recall or were you ever told why they didn’t make Allerton [Married Student Housing] evacuate?

[Judith Frohlich]: What came out during the hearings, which were several months later, because I’m sure you have in all the other interviews and data, you know, all these hundreds of universities had closed after Kent. So, then Nixon appointed, you know, this commission, this hearing on campus unrest and they went all over. And of course, what it turned out is, I guess what they’re finding out about the police situation now with all the unarmed, you know, people—young Blacks that they’re killing. There’s a—you know, police violence going on, and what they found out when this campus went around, I mean when this hearing went around to all these campuses was that it wasn’t students that were really acting so badly as much as it was these people they were sending on campus, ill-trained, ill-prepared, and handling these students, some of whom, I’m not saying they were all perfect, believe you me, but many of whom were—the students were high-spirited, just, perhaps not acting 100 percent perfectly, but being treated as if they were absolutely violent, horrible criminals who needed to be mowed down. So, it was really the militia or the police who were coming on these campuses and hurting these children in the worst possible ways.

So, by the time this commission came to Kent, and Kent State was the last campus of about, I don’t recall exactly, but they had been, I’m sure, to over a dozen campuses, or maybe it was even more than that. So, by the time they came to Kent, they—even though the people who sat on this commission were people like the—a retired editor of the Christian-Science Monitor, and a deacon of a church, and all these very elderly, conservative, white-haired, all white, all middle-class—upper middle-class I should say. The type of commission you would expect that Nixon would appoint. And I know what he wanted from them was a finding that the students had behaved horribly, badly, terribly, violently and all of the military and police involved had to do what they did, and in fact, the questions they asked and what they got people to say is that because someone had long hair, or looked differently, or dressed differently, did not make them worthy of being shot down dead. And that’s the kind of thing that came out in the questions they were asking. And this commission really was appalled, you could see it, and they said it in what they were—in what they were stating, in what they were saying, and you know, their responses to the general in charge of the National Guard and the people they had who testified, and in fact, initially, the courts in Ohio tried to indict several students, and all of that was rescinded, taken away, but they never did indict any of the National Guardsmen, and like has been happening in this day in age with no police being held responsible for killing unarmed people. Although, until just a few days ago when we found out that those six officers were indicted. So, history repeats itself, doesn’t it?

[Interviewer]: Yes. Well I’m wondering if, since May 4, as you look back on what you just shared, do you think any of your views about what took place have changed, or has anything remained the same?

[Judith Frohlich]: I think many of my views have been confirmed and I believe more than ever that what I thought then was right and true, and what I think now is just the way things should be and must be in our country. People must come together and must help each other and support each other and accept each other. That’s how we become a really great and good country. And I believed it then and I believe it now even more so. I think—I’m hopeful that someday we may get there. I don’t know, I still think there’s so much work to be done.

[Interviewer]: Well, is there anything else that you would like to share about your experiences at that time that I didn’t think to ask that you feel should be included in this interview?

[Judith Frohlich]: I think you asked many good questions, as I said, not being a witness, my husband and I read everything that—almost—I shouldn’t say everything, but we read many, many things that were printed about Kent. I think that going back and seeing the memorial and the museum [May 4 Visitors Center] that has been set up was very, very meaningful to us, and I think the university has done a great job. It was a life-changing event to live through and it—I’ll tell you one thing. We went to the Newseum, have you heard of that, in Washington, D.C.?

[Interviewer]: I have not.

[Judith Frohlich]: Okay, well one of the newer museums in Washington, D.C. is called—is n-e-w-s, Newseum. So instead of the word museum, it’s called the Newseum. It’s really a wonderful place if you can ever get there, and it’s not quite in the mall area where all the big monuments are, it’s a little off the beaten path. But, they have many photographs and exhibits about major news stories from the time that photography, I guess, started, and important events were recorded. I would say it’s mostly American, but, you know, major events from around the world, as well, and the whole museum, and it’s a couple floors of things from all over the world, and some video and what not. But it’s quite an interesting place. So, I’m not sure now if it’s the first or second floor, but in any event, at one point, in quite a large area are several photographs from Kent State, and, of course, one of the centerpieces of their exhibit is of the girl, I can’t remember her name now, but kneeling over the laid-out body.

[Interviewer]: [Mary] Ann Vecchio.

[Judith Frohlich]: Yes, yes, yes. And so Ken and I were looking at some of the pictures and when we got to that one, which is quite a large photograph and captures quite a few people’s attention, and we weren’t even aware that there were some other people around us and we got teary looking at that, and I’m teary thinking about it now, and I said to Ken, “Do you ever think that we’ll be able to think about it, talk about it, forget it, that it’ll be just, you know, some distant memory for us?” And he said to me, “How could it ever be, you know, living through that was so unbelievable to us.”

And, so, a man—as I said, we weren’t even aware that there were people around us. So, a man said “Pardon me,” and he was with a boy who looked about ten years old. And the man said “Pardon me, were you there, were you at Kent State when this happened?” And we said “Yes,” and so he said to his son, “These people were there when this terrible event took place, when these soldiers killed some innocent children, it was so terrible, that was such a bad thing.” And he said, “That was really a bad thing, I was just a kid in school when that happened.” I mean, this man was obviously younger than we were. But I felt so gratified that this man was telling his son that, you know, that this was such a terrible event and he remembered it. You know, he had been a young boy in school, but he remembered it as being a terrible event and he was telling his son, “Oh, these people were there.” You know, I—you know, Ken and I just kind of walked away afterwards, but I thought, Oh, there are good people out there who remember this the same way we do. So, I just wanted to add that.

[Interviewer]: Well, Judith, I would just like to say thank you for sharing your story with our department today and this concludes our interview.

[Judith Frohlich]: Thank you very much.

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