A weekly programme which focuses on people and the situations which shape their lives
Reporters Jim Douglas Henry, Jeremy James, Jeanne La Chard, Gillian Strickland, Desmond Wilcox, Harold Williamson

This week: The Mood of America: 1: Kent, Ohio
Four students were shot dead, more wounded, when National Guardsmen opened fire during a campus demonstration against American involvement in Cambodia. And a small university town, tragically, makes world headlines.
The shootings at Kent State University hardened attitudes that had been there all along. Militant students now see the enemy as coming out into the open. Diehard townspeople talk of a chance to 'finish the job' the National Guard started and put down what they call 'the freaks and hippies' for good. Both university and town authorities waver between repression and conciliation.
Moderates on both sides have become uncertain. Above all, the situation in Kent underlines the failure of understanding between generations: between rebellious youngsters and anxious parents, between radical students and conservative townspeople.
In the first of four programmes John Percival reports on the tensions underlying the present mood of America.