MILLEDGEVILLE – As it has for more than 40 years, a finned artifact stands watch day and night on Milledgeville High School's front lawn.

It might appear ordinary or ornamental at first glance, but during active duty, the missile was ready to take to the skies, capable of delivering a nuclear warhead and a fiery rain of destruction for 15 to 30 miles.

Now marked with white with orange and black letters, the school mascot perched on a marquee is what remains of the “Honest John" surface-to-surface artillery rocket, a relic of the Cold War that was developed in the 1950s at Redstone Arsenal in Huntsville, Alabama.

Millies to Missiles

Before they became the Milledgeville Missiles, the school and its athletic teams were known as Millies, a longtime tribute to a town grist mill.

The name was voted out 56 years ago, when the Missile identity was adopted.

“It’s very unique,” said Chadwick-Milledgeville Schools Superintendent Tim Schurman, who has been at the helm for 10 years. “It’s symbolic of strength and pride in our community.”

Coaches and students campaigned for almost 2 years to find a mascot that "would not sound so feminine,” according to a 2008 letter from Milledgeville resident Lois Simmons, which is kept in a thick binder of town memorabilia at Wysox Library.

In 1971, the local Jaycees built a marquee to honor a student who had died in a car accident 7 years earlier; the next step was to find a missile, the letter said.

Another letter, dated Dec. 23, 1969, from Redstone Arsenal to Principal Richard Duty, acknowledges receipt of an inquiry by school officials to acquire a missile; it indicates that the request was made that Oct. 15.

The connection in procuring the rocket was Robert Weidman, a scientist who grew up in Savanna, said William Ritenour, 85, Milledgeville mayor at the time.

Ritenour, now retired, served 28 years as mayor, then 8 years as Carroll County Board chairman, then one more term as mayor. He is a 1947 Milledgeville High graduate.

"[The missile] means quite a bit to me," said Ritenour, who lives in plain view of the artifact on Holcomb Avenue that he helped bring to town. "I'm very proud."

Weidman was his uncle, and he worked as a civilian supervisor at Savanna Army Depot during World War II. Then Redstone Arsenal called, and Weidman followed his love of rocket science, excited to be transferred, Ritenour said.

Redstone is a garrison that also is home to NASA’s Marshall Space Flight Center, and the Army Aviation and Missile Command. Weidman, who was in research and development, worked on improvements to rocket physics and design.

Ritenour called in a favor, asking his uncle to see whether the school could acquire a missile, he said.

'Honest John' comes to town

During active service, the "Honest John," as the weapon system was called, could be fired like artillery from a rail on the back of a utility transport truck, said Russell Rodgers, 55, command historian at the U.S. Army Aviation and Missile Command at Redstone.

The missile was free, as long as someone could pick it up at Blue Grass Army Depot in Kentucky, about an hour’s drive southeast of Lexington and a holding area for demilitarized weapon systems.

Gene Behrens, 75, of Milledgeville, volunteered for the pickup, and arrived in a grain truck. He figured he could swing by after making a delivery, he said.

“[The missile] seemed pretty big,” Behrens said. “I went down, and they knew I was coming, of course. I had no problem picking it up.”

The missile, fins removed, was packed in a boxed container, gutted except for the motor and an inert warhead.

It's a favorite of modelers because its profile is so recognizable, Rodgers said. The body is slender with a bulbous top – the warhead – that comes to a point.

When asked the estimated production cost of the missile, Rodgers said in an email that "price per unit is simply beyond finding at this point," and that systems like those were viewed under total program costs.

Paperwork Behrens obtained for the transport, though, notes "rocket motor M65 training round inert" and "337500" under total price in dollars. Another document has "warhead section 762MM rocket empty M1A2" with "137000" under total price in dollars.

A letter of receipt provided to Principal Richard Duty by Redstone Arsenal indicated that the missile weighed 969 pounds at delivery, and its motor clocked in at a hefty 6,538 pounds – about the weight of two cars when fully assembled.

The fins, it noted, would have to be "locally fabricated."

Using a wrecker and a crane, Byvick Service Station of Milledgeville helped Behrens move the missile from the truck to the school's vocational/agricultural center, Behrens said.

An aged Polaroid photo dated June 1970 shows two trucks and the container with a backdrop of a cloudy sky. A second photo shows three men – two on the ground and one in the back of the grain truck – working with the missile container.

Students and volunteers helped extricate the rocket's engine, which likely was sold for scrap, Behrens added.

In July, the marquee was updated to an electronic screen in memory of Rock Falls businessman Tim Litwiller, 46, a 1986 Milledgeville High grad who died Feb. 1, 2014, in a snowmobile accident in Wisconsin.

More on the missile

The "Honest John" missile once was a key element of the U.S. weapons inventory, but no longer is in service.

It was the first rocket capable of deploying a nuclear payload, and in later variants, conventional explosives and Sarin nerve gas were used.

According to Wikipedia, in late 1950, Maj. Gen. Holger Toftoy, then a colonel, was overseeing the development of the rocket. The project was in danger of cancellation because officials thought such a large, unguided rocket could not possibly be accurate. On a trip to White Sands Missile Range, Toftoy met a Texan prone to making unbelievable statements. Whenever anyone expressed doubt about the man's claims, he would respond, "Why, around these parts, I'm called 'Honest John!'" Because the project was being questioned, Toftoy suggested the nickname to his superiors.

Go to http://shawurl.com/1v9o for more information on the missile's heritage, and http://shawurl.com/1v9p for production history.