Pershing Rifles

The drill team began as a prize company. Pershing picked university cadets for Company A, and in March 1892 it won the Maiden Prize at the National Competitive Drills in Omaha, where the city's citizens presented a large silver cup, the Omaha Cup. He studied law at the same time and received his LL.B. in 1893, and his friend Charles Dawes talked him out of leaving the Army for a legal career. Former Company A members founded the Varsity Rifles in October 1894 and renamed the group the Pershing Rifles in 1895.

What the plaque says

Pershing Rifles General John J. Pershing, commander of the American Expeditionary Forces to Europe in World War I, was Professor of Military Science at the University of Nebraska-Lincoln between September 1891 and June 1895. Upon his arrival in Lincoln, which was to become his family's home, Pershing found the morale of the Reserve Officers Training Corps at low ebb. To infuse life into the corps, Pershing built an elite drill team which eventually became known as the Society of Pershing Rifles. The organization served its purpose well, and from 1900-1911 it carried prestige not only in military circles but in the social life of the University as well. Many of its young officer-graduates were on active duty in the Spanish-American War and in World War I. After Pershing was transferred to another post, interest in the Rifles waned and in 1917 it was disbanded. Interest returned in the 1920s, and in 1925 a chapter was installed at Ohio State University. Today Pershing Rifle Societies are found in over 100 universities. Pershing was elected to the Nebraska Hall of Fame in 1964, and his bust placed in the Nebraska State Capitol in 1965. Dedicated by the Pershing Rifles Pledge Class of 1984 Company A (Pershing's Own) Nebraska State Historical Society

Where it stands

Worth the stop nearby

• Nebraska State Capitol — 0.9 mi
  Bertram Goodhue's 400-foot tower on the prairie, built in four phases from 1922 to 1932 and paid off on completion, home of the only one-house legislature in the country.
• Strategic Air Command & Aerospace Museum — 24 mi
  Two hangar-sized halls beside I-80 near Ashland holding the bombers and reconnaissance planes of the command that ran America's nuclear force from Offutt, south of Omaha, from 1948 to 1992.

More markers nearby

• The Lewis-Syford House — steps away
• The Nebraska State Historical Society — 0.3 mi
• The University of Nebraska — 0.3 mi
• The North Bottoms — 0.4 mi