National Guardsmen at Kent State, May 4, 1970.

May the 4th be with you!

It is, but in a different way than I suspect it is for most people my age.  I was ten years old when Star Wars was released, and it was, without a doubt, the iconic movie of my childhood. I had the action figures, played “Death Star” behind the couch, wore a Star Wars t-shirt in my fifth grade class photo.  But the whole “May the 4th” thing is fairly recent, and the date still means something very different to me.

It was around the same time, maybe a little earlier, that I learned that the words “Kent State” were a bad thing.  Always attuned to current events, I remember reading about a controversy, reported in the Columbus Dispatch, about building a new gym at the college on land scarred by gunfire less than a…