Sandra Lee "Sandy" Scheuer (; August 11, 1949 – May 4, 1970) was a student at

Kent State University Kent State University (KSU) is a public research university in Kent, Ohio. The university also includes seven regional campuses in Northeast Ohio and additional facilities in the region and internationally. Regional campuses are located in ...

Kent Kent is a county in South East England and one of the home counties. It borders Greater London to the north-west, Surrey to the west and East Sussex to the south-west, and Essex to the north across the estuary of the River Thames; it faces ...

Ohio Ohio () is a state in the Midwestern region of the United States. Of the fifty U.S. states, it is the 34th-largest by area, and with a population of nearly 11.8 million, is the seventh-most populous and tenth-most densely populated. The sta ...

, when she was killed by

Ohio National Guard The Ohio National Guard comprises the Ohio Army National Guard and the Ohio Air National Guard. The commander-in-chief of the Ohio Army National Guard is the governor of the U.S. state of Ohio. If the Ohio Army National Guard is called to fed ...

smen in the

Kent State shootings The Kent State shootings, also known as the May 4 massacre and the Kent State massacre,"These would be the first of many probes into what soon became known as the Kent State Massacre. Like the Boston Massacre almost exactly two hundred years bef ...

Background

Scheuer was born in

Youngstown, Ohio Youngstown is a city in the U.S. state of Ohio, and the largest city and county seat of Mahoning County. At the 2020 census, Youngstown had a city population of 60,068. It is a principal city of the Youngstown–Warren metropolitan area, whi ...

, the daughter of Sarah (Lacko) and Martin Scheuer. She had an older sister, Audrey. She was Jewish. She was an honors student in speech therapy, and was a graduate of

Boardman High School Boardman High School is a high school in Boardman Township, Ohio, United States. It is the only high school in the Boardman Local School District. Athletic teams compete as the Boardman Spartans in the Ohio High School Athletic Association as a ...

. She did not take part in the

Vietnam War The Vietnam War (also known by other names) was a conflict in Vietnam, Laos, and Cambodia from 1 November 1955 to the fall of Saigon on 30 April 1975. It was the second of the Indochina Wars and was officially fought between North Vietnam a ...

protest A protest (also called a demonstration, remonstration or remonstrance) is a public expression of objection, disapproval or dissent towards an idea or action, typically a political one. Protests can be thought of as acts of cooper ...

s that preceded the shootings. She was shot in the neck with an M-1 rifle from a distance of 130 yards (119 m) while walking between classes. The bullet severed her

jugular vein The jugular veins are veins that take deoxygenated blood from the head back to the heart via the superior vena cava. The internal jugular vein descends next to the internal carotid artery and continues posteriorly to the sternocleidomastoid mu ...

and she died within five or six minutes from

loss of blood Bleeding, hemorrhage, haemorrhage or blood loss, is blood escaping from the circulatory system from damaged blood vessels. Bleeding can occur Internal bleeding, internally, or externally either through a natural opening such as the Mouth (human) ...

. According to the account of her boyfriend Bruce Burkland, Scheuer "was walking with one of her speech and hearing therapy students across the green. Caught in the gunfire, neither Sandra nor the young man had anything to do with the assembly of students on the green." Three other unarmed students were also killed in the shootings: Allison Krause, Jeffrey Miller, and

William Knox Schroeder William Knox Schroeder (; July 20, 1950 – May 4, 1970) was a student at Kent State University, Ohio, when he was killed by Ohio National Guardsmen in the Kent State shootings. Background Schroeder was born in Cincinnati, Ohio, the son of Fl ...

. The shootings led to protests and a national

student strike Campus protest or student protest is a form of student activism that takes the form of protest at university campuses. Such protests encompass a wide range of activities that indicate student dissatisfaction with a given political or academ ...

, causing hundreds of campuses to close because of both violent and non-violent demonstrations. The Kent State campus remained closed for six weeks. Five days after the shootings, 100,000 people demonstrated in

Washington, D.C. ) , image_skyline = , image_caption = Clockwise from top left: the Washington Monument and Lincoln Memorial on the National Mall, United States Capitol, Logan Circle, Jefferson Memorial, White House, Adams Morgan, ...

, against the war. Scheuer had been a member of the

Alpha Xi Delta Alpha Xi Delta (, often referred to as A-''"Zee"''-D ) is a women's fraternity founded on April 17, 1893. Baird's Manual is also available online hereThe Baird's Manual Online Archive homepage at Lombard College in Galesburg, Illinois, United Stat ...

sorority, and current members of this sorority speak in her memory each year on the Kent State University campus at the May 4 Task Force's commemoration of the 1970 tragedy. In 2018 an exhibit in memory of Scheuer called "Sandy's Scrapbook," based on an actual scrapbook she kept while attending Kent State, opened at the University's May 4 Visitor Center.

In popular culture

Just after Scheuer's death, the English songwriter

Harvey Andrews Harvey John Andrews (born 7 May 1943 in Stechford, Birmingham) is an English singer-songwriter and poet. Andrews has produced 16 albums singing his own songs, many of which have also been recorded by other artists. Career From 1964, Andrews su ...

composed a song titled "Hey Sandy", whose lyrics are addressed to her: In the song "

", which was written immediately after the shootings, folk rocker

Neil Young Neil Percival Young (born November 12, 1945) is a Canadian-American singer and songwriter. After embarking on a music career in Winnipeg in the 1960s, Young moved to Los Angeles, joining Buffalo Springfield with Stephen Stills, Richie Fur ...

made a reference to Scheuer in the chorus: Scheuer is also remembered in Canadian poet Gary Geddes' poem "Sandra Lee Scheuer", found in his 1980 collection ''The Acid Test''. An image of a memorial to Scheuer was included in the CD case to ''

The Argument ''The Argument'' is the sixth and most recent studio album from the post-hardcore band Fugazi released on October 16, 2001, through Dischord Records. It was recorded at Don Zientara's Inner Ear Studios in Arlington, VA and the Dischord House bet ...

'' (2001) by Fugazi.

References

External links

*
Sandy Scheuer: May 4 Archive
{{DEFAULTSORT:Scheuer, Sandra Lee 1949 births 1970 deaths American people of the Vietnam War 20th-century American Jews Kent State University alumni Kent State shootings People from Youngstown, Ohio Deaths by firearm in Ohio

Background

In popular culture

References

Further reading

External links