Evening Republican, Volume 21, Number 105, Rensselaer, Jasper County, 11 May 1918 — The Pershing Rifles. [ARTICLE]

The Pershing Rifles.

Fifty yellow and blue badges, the insignia of the Pershing Rifles, a crack military company of the University of Nebraska, are being treasured by as many former students of that institution these days. One of them is William Green of Abilene, Kan. “It was Pershing’s own idea,’* says Mr. Green. “We had been picked from the military company of which he was instructor after coming from West Point to Lincoln. We met in his room one night to organize and ‘The Lieut,’ as we familiarly called the instructor —he was a second lieutenant then—asked what colors we wanted on our badges. “ 'Yellow and blue —cavalry colors.’ "‘I have the very thing,’ he responded, and went to a chiffonier from which he took a brandnew pair of cavalry trousers. With shears he ruthlessly cut them across, making fifty badges, each with a strip of blue and the yellow leg stripe. We called the organization the ’Pershing Rifles’ and were very proud of the honor. Pershing took us on long camping trips under strict military regulations, and we felt that he was more of a father than a professor to us. “He never forgot his boys', as he called us. The night he arrived in San Antonio to take charge of the Southwest division after the death of General Funston, I was at his hotel. Though a score of prominent men and officers were waiting to see him he recognized me and spent five minutes asking after the students and laughing over the university days. “He was a strict disciplinarian, always wanting things done in a hurry—which makes reasonable his Impatience now to get at the Germans—but Intensely human. He was the one professor to whom the boys went with their troubles —and that is a good test of the human side of anybody.”