Events Calendar
In This Section
Most Read Stories
Police accuse bank robbery suspect of gobbling up note (with dashcam video)
Victim of beating in Kent last week is declared dead at Akron hospital
Akron man killed in crash on his street
Browns find another way to lose
Can DNA tests free ex-Akron captain?
After 30 years at the helm of Akron Children's, Considine still looks to future
Dad accused of forcing son into field, killing him
Man found dead in North Akron home is identified
Blogs:
Pets:
Cat-loving chihuahua suckles seven abandoned kittens
The Heldenfiles:
Sunday Notebook
Patrick McManamon:
Browns sick after sick loss in Detroit
Akron Zips:
Zips advance to Sweet Sixteen
Tribe Matters:
Seven players added to Tribe’s 40-man roster
Cleveland Browns:
Post-game defensive quotes
Kent State Sports:
Kent State defeats Rochester College, 63-44
Cleveland Cavaliers:
Gameblog: Cavs vs. Philadelphia 76ers
Buckeye Blogging:
OSU – Michigan college football rivals meet in Baghdad
Varsity Letters:
Four area football teams play tonight
All Da King's Men:
The Onion, By Any Other Name…
Blog of Mass Destruction:
Will Health Care Reform Pass?
Akron Law Café:
Health Care Financing Reform: (70) Savings in Medicare Advantage
See Jane Style:
Vintage Chic
Car Chase:
TIME TO GET YOUR COLLECTOR CARS WINTERIZED
Let's Talk Real Estate:
Faye Dunaway to be Evicted?
Ohio Travels with Betty:
Monique asks how to get tickets for the Polar Express.
Sound Check:
Steely Dan Plays "The Royal Scam" at E.J. Thomas Hall
HRLite House:
Personal Rant – You are All Wrong About Jobs, or the Lack of Jobs, Being the Reason People Do Not Live in NEO
Akron Gamer:
Nintendo's Mario endures even as games come and go
Private funeral Monday for former student shot by Ohio National Guard
Published on Sunday, Jun 15, 2008
Beacon Journal staff report
Robert ''Robby'' Stamps, one of 13 students shot by Ohio National Guardsmen during a Vietnam War protest May 4, 1970, at Kent State University, has died of complications from pneumonia.
Mr. Stamps, 58, died Wednesday in Tallahassee, Fla. A private funeral is scheduled for Monday at a friend's house. A memorial service is planned in San Diego.
Although the random bullet that struck him in the lower back colored his life for decades to come, Mr. Stamps lived an active professional life as a counselor, author, musician and inventor.
The residue of May 4 remained with him. And he often reflected on it.
''The guardsmen who killed four students and wounded nine others have neither told the truth nor been held accountable for their actions,'' he wrote in a guest editorial for the Akron Beacon Journal in March 1996.
Mr. Stamps grew up in a white-collar neighborhood in the Cleveland suburb of South Euclid. His father was a career military man who would have ''rather seen me go to jail than go to Vietnam to fight, and he told me so,'' Mr. Stamps was quoted as saying.
Fateful decision
Because Mr. Stamps suffered from Crohn's disease, his doctor advised him to attend a college within a 45-minute radius of home. He chose Kent State.
His goals were simple.
''I wasn't even thinking about my future,'' he was quoted as saying in Kent State's Burr magazine in 2000. ''I just wanted to graduate because I was used to spending every summer in the hospital.''
He double-majored in Spanish and sociology during an exciting time, he said: ''Students felt as if they had the power to change the world.''
He was in the wrong place at the wrong time when the Ohio National Guard opened fire on the crowd at an anti-war rally at Kent State.
''Instinctively, I turned around and started to run away,'' he told the magazine. ''I took about three or four steps, and that's when it got me in the back.''
Mr. Stamps recalled sitting in the front seat of the ambulance for the ride to Robinson Memorial Hospital in nearby Ravenna. Behind him were Allison Krause and Jeffrey Miller, both of whom died from their wounds.
The next day, Mr. Stamps' parents took him to University Hospitals in Cleveland for care of the bullet wound that entered through his back, went down into his leg and broke his femur bone.
Eventually, Mr. Stamps returned to Kent State to finish his bachelor's degree, graduating magna cum laude.
Professional life
He continued his studies at KSU, earning a master's degree in sociology in 1975 and a master's degree in journalism and mass communication in 1999.
Mr. Stamps wore many hats in his professional life. He was a teacher and a counselor treating the alcohol and drug-addicted. He wrote three nonfiction books, including No Risk Used Car Buying in 2001. He also was a songwriter.
He ran a business calledauthorswanted.com to help others write manuscripts, find agents and publish their work.
In 2000, Mr. Stamps spoke out against plans to include a taped speech by convicted cop killer Mumia Abu-Jamal in the May 4 commemoration, fearing his comments would shift the focus of the annual event.
Toward the end of his life, Mr. Stamps was beset by Lyme disease. He and his wife, Teresa Sumrall, set up a Web site that asked for donations.
''The medical and associated costs to treat this illness are staggering,'' the Web site read.
Mr. Stamps never forgot about what happened at Kent State.
''What I thought about then is that we had a military industrial complex in charge of things, profiting handsomely from making war. And I think the same thing today,'' he told the Burr.
Mr. Stamps is survived by his wife.
Arrangements were being handled by Beggs Funeral Home in Madison, Fla.
Get the full article here.
Comments
Click here to post your comments
