All day on Tuesday, rain clouds threatened to dampen Kent State University's dedication of nine bronze plaques memorializing those wounded by the Ohio National Guard on May 4, 1970.  Around 11:30 a.m., two-and-a-half hours from when the ceremony was scheduled to take place, it began raining. 

Organizers of the event had thought ahead. Erected in the Taylor Hall parking lot stood a large white tent. Underneath, roughly 140 black folding chairs stood in neat rows. As water cascaded off the tent's roof, personnel buzzed around plugging in PA speakers and checking microphones; media people busied themselves setting up cameras and snapping photos.

Each year's commemoration events have a theme, and this year's programming was no different. 

For the 52nd anniversary of the killing of four and wounding of nine students by Ohio National Guard troops, the May 4 Task Force, formed in 1975 to ensure the continued commemoration of the memory of the killings in 1970, chose "The Power of Our Voices" as its theme. 

"The events of May 4 really brought the war home," said Avery Hall, chair of the May 4 Task Force. "It was student voices, and student activism that really did that .. .our words, our activism have power and influence in this space."

At Tuesday's dedication, KSU President Todd Diacon took the stage, joined by several of those who were wounded in 1970 — Thomas Grace, Dean Kahler, John Cleary, Joseph Lewis and Donald Scott Mackenzie. Alan Canfora died last year at the age of 71, but his sister Rosann "Chic" Canfora was in attendance.

Diacon spoke briefly about how important it is to see things in person, and how impactful touring the site of the shootings with the survivors, before introducing Kahler. 

"One of the things my father carried to his grave," Kahler told the crowd, "was the fact that the rifle he carried in World War II is the same rifle that shot his son." Kahler was paralyzed from the waist down after being shot by a Guardsman.

He thanked the university for its work in placing markers where nine students were wounded. 

"I'm still here, 52 years later," Kahler said to a standing ovation.

Later that evening, people began gathering under the tent still standing in the Taylor Hall parking lot, and another, smaller shelter on the commons for a candlelight vigil around campus.

For a little less than an hour, the attendees snaked around Kent State's perimeter, silent and reverent. Volunteers followed the march armed with lighters to re-ignite candles blown out by the wind.

The march ended in the Taylor Hall parking lot where people split off to begin their 30-minute shifts standing vigil in the spots where four students — Sandra Scheuer, Allison Krause, Jeffrey Miller, and William Schroder —  were killed by the National Guard in 1970. The vigil continued until 12:23 p.m. Wednesday, the time when the National Guard opened fire. 

Rabbi Michael Ross, senior Jewish educator at Hillell at Kent State, explained that the the Mourner's Kaddish, the Jewish prayer for the dead, is spoken to honor Scheuer, Krause and Miller who were Jewish.

"It's a prayer that concludes every Jewish ritual where there's 10 people gathered," said Ross. 

Sammi Brinkhoff, Christian Heller, and Haydn Palmer spent the march relighting candles for participants. Brinkoff expressed a sense of duty to carry on the activist work of those who came before them at Kent State.

"I just wanted to be part of something bigger than myself," Brinkhoff said. 

Heller and Palmer are both active in the Students for a Democratic Society, an organization that played a significant role in the planning of the May 4, 1970 protests.

Heller said that they've been working hard to keep the memory of the shootings alive in people's heads. 

"It's important to have this kind of event to show support, and to have this moment of remembrance," Palmer said.

On Wednesday, crowds began gathering in the Reflections Gallery at Taylor Hall.  The draw was a panel discussion moderated by current task force chair Avery Hall featuring four former members of the May 4 Task Force — founding member Dean Kahler, who was shot and permanently paralyzed by the National Guard; Rosann "Chic" Canfora, an eyewitness and survivor of the attack,and Alan Canfora's sister; Rodney Flauhaus, chair of the task force from 1982-86, and the program director for the 50th anniversary ceremonies; and Ethan Lower, co-chair of the task force from 2020-21.

Afterwards, the crowd moved out to the commons for the commemoration ceremony. 

Before speakers took to the stage, the Victory Bell on the commons rang out at 12:23 p.m., the moment that the shootings took place 52 years ago. 

After a moment of silence, Tiera Moore, graduate student member of the May 4 Education Committee; Diacon; Amy Reynolds, dean of the College of Communication and Information; and Canfora stepped up to the podium to offer their remarks to the crowd before keynote speaker Jon Meacham made his address. 

"Remembering the shootings of May 4, 1970 matters," Meacham said. "The mechanics of memory matter. For without memory we are lost and disoriented, and more vulnerable to despair."

While it might seem counterintuitive, he continued, the pain associated with deeply scarring memories is important. 

"To fail to commemorate the experiences of this date risks obscuring the lives and lessons of that day, and of all the days that have come since," he said. "And that lesson is arguably this: America's divisions can turn fatal, and we have a sacred and vivid, and even tactile obligation, to seek light from darkness, and good from evil, and triumph from tragedy."

Contact reporter Derek Kreider at dkreider@gannett.com.