Other Coed Groups

I have no idea how many coed groups affiliated with Pershing Rifles there were or when they actually started!  While I was in CAPERS I did a lot of research from old copies of the Pershing Rifleman yearbooks, but they were all thrown away in the 1970's (not by me).  I wish I had them now, as they could help with this question.  At every Pershing Rifles National Convention I attended, I talked to as many people as possible to find out if they knew of coed groups in their area that I didn't know about.  When we got back, we'd contact them in an attempt to get them to charter with CAPERS.

We also don't know when the first coed group started.  The earliest on I have found mentioned on the internet (my current method of research) was in 1960 at Morgan State University.  The group was called "Persherettes".  The history of coed groups a Morgan State University is interesting.  We have reports that there were attempts to organize several different coed groups there, including Kaydettes (which was probably around the time the the Kaydettes at the University of Oklahoma, January 1965, started a national organization before CAPERS were started.  The one that worked was Pershing Angels which started in February 1965.  This group eventually chartered with Coed Affiliates Pershing Rifles (CAPERS).  CAPER Companies were allowed to keep their local name and there were other CAPER Companies that were known as Pershing Angels.  After CAPERS officially ended, these groups and others got together to start a new national organization called Pershing Angels.  One of the CAPER alumni from Morgan State is the Pershing Angels National Commander!

Are you confused yet?  It's hard to make sense of it all without any written, official records.  I don't have any idea what happened to them.  

There were several CAPER Companies that were called Kaydettes locally.  Two of them, Company E-2 at University of Minnesota and A-2 at Pennsylvania State University, may well have chartered with Kaydettes before they were selected to be the National Headquarters for CAPERS.  That's because they are two companies that I'm pretty sure were chartered before I pledged in the fall of 1967.  Until I found out that the Kaydettes started a their own national organization in January of 1965, I was very impressed that they chartered 7 companies in one semester's existence.  It may have been in a year and a half instead!

I know of one other local name of a CAPER Company.  CAPER Company A-3 at Indiana University were known as the Crimson Cadettes.  There may have been others, but I just haven't found them yet.

Some of the other coed group names that I knew of (or have found) were Kadettes, Petticoat Platoon, Cadence Countesses, E-Co Berets, and Kentucky Babes (and their specialty drill team, Les Sabres).  During my year as CAPER National Commander, we started a local company (but I never wrote a charter for it) and we called it Sabers and Lace since we had a Saber Drill team, too.

If you know of any coed groups that aren't on our units page, please let me know.  All coed groups affiliated with a Pershing Rifles Company may join our "group" and be eligible for membership in the Federation of Pershing Rifles Alumni Associations and be considered a Pershing Rifles alumni.  We all have something in common and we welcome them to join us and celebrate that common thread.....being a female, hanging out in the ROTC buildings with all the guys, doing things with their P/Rs, competing in drill meets, working on service projects....and on and on!  You are welcome!