Army Field Rations - Survival Food

U S Army Field Rations: ( K Ration, C Ration, D Ration, etc.)

What did you have for breakfast today? - Eggs & Bacon, Fried Potatoes, or maybe, trying to avoid "Heart Attack Material" - beans, marmalade or VEGEMITE on toast? - Perhaps you're a WEETBIX kid – or other grain cereal type, - all swimming with milk (hot or cold?) Yummee !

- Wikipedia says that Dr Ancel Keys, a University of Minnesota physiologist, designed a Ready To Eat non-perishable meal in 1941 for the US War Department. Planned to be a pocketable one man emergency meal that would supply enough food value (2830 calories a day) to keep a man going when neither A or B field rations were obtainable. 

Contents varied but might be pemmican biscuits, raisins, a peanut bar, and a bouillon paste plus lemon beverage powder, canned processed meat, and a small D Ration bar. All packed in a military unbleached tan rectangular card box with black lettering. - An inner box printed with the meal type was later waxed cardboard for water resistance and proved useful to troops for fire lighting.

 - N Philbrick (in 'The Heart Of The Sea') relates how Dr Keys during WW2 conducted an experimental study of starvation with conscientious objectors (volunteers) held in a stadium on campus at the University of Minnisota where they were fed a limited diet similar to the kind of foods refugees might scavange during wartime, for six months - to lose 25% of their body weight. 

Despite the clinically safe circumstances of the experiment,- the volunteers suffered both severe physiological and psychological distress. As they lost weight, the men became lethargic, increasingly irritable, weak, suffered blackouts, swollen limbs, and had difficulty concentrating. - Even during the recovery period the men continued to loose weight for weeks. The K Ration was named after Dr Keys as 'K' sounded distinct from A, B (Cooked or fresh foods), and C, D types.

C Ration was an individual canned cooked wet meal (often beans) issued to military forces to supplement K Ration. It was replaced by the Meal Combat Individual ( MCI) in 1958 and by the MRE in 1975.

D Ration was Military Chocolate, - meant to "taste a little better than boiled potato" – Wrapped in aluminum foil it was hard, heat resistant, and not meant to be pleasant to eat. Each bar gave 600 calories as an emergency supplement.

Marty K.