The Coolidge Examiner

Christmas Dinner On a Battleship

MR. AND MRS. BLANK, let us say, are having some of their kinfolks for Christmas dinner, on a farm, ranch or plantation, or in a cottage somewhere in America.

The conversation turns to a boy of the neighborhood who is in the navy.

"I wonder what Frank is doing today," wonders Uncle George.

"And what he is having for Christmas dinner," Aunt Josie speculates.

"Navy beans and sowbelly, I betcha," opines Grandpa, who served in the Civil war.

"Let's see," says Pa. "Frank's on a battleship, isn't he?"

"Yes, it's the Arkansas. This information from Ma."

"Then he'll have a swell feed," comments little Bill, who reads a lot and thinks maybe he will join the navy himself some day.

Just to satisfy the curiosity of Pa. and also Ma Blank, Aunt Josie, Uncle George, Grandma, Grandpa, little Bill and the neighbors generally, suppose we step into the quartermaster's office on the U. S. S. Arkansas and sit at a mahogany desk with Chief Commissary Steward Jimmy East and find out all about what the boys on a battleship have to eat at Christmas time.

"First," says Chief Jimmy, as he takes out his fountain pen and reaches for a sheet of letter paper with "U. S. S. Arkansas" printed at the top, "I'll give you the menu we served last Christmas."

Here it is:

MENU

Celery Hearts Olives Sweet Pickles

Fruit Cocktail

Cream of Tomato Soup

Saltines

Roast Young Turkey

Oyster Dressing

Cranberry Sauce

Giblet Gravy

Mashed Potatoes

Green Peas

Cauliflower Candied Sweet Potatoes

Butter Sauce

Hot Finger-Rolls

Tomato and Lettuce Salad

Thousand Island Dressing

Assorted Fruits Nuts

Hard Candy

Hot Mince Pie

Ice Cream

Chocolate Cake

Coffee

Cigars and Cigarettes

"That dinner," says Chief Jimmy, "was served to the crew of 1,100, at a cost of $1.10 per man. In addition, the crew had as guests 200 orphans and other needy children."

And Chief Jimmy made this memorandum of the main items, reading each aloud as he put it down:

Celery, 400 lbs.; olives, 20 gals.; canned tomatoes, 150 lbs.; crackers, 200 lbs.; turkey, 1,200 lbs.; cranberries, 300 lbs.; Irish potatoes, 600 lbs.; sweet potatoes, 600 lbs.; green peas, 200 lbs.; cauliflower, 300 lbs.; hot rolls, 2,400; ham, 400 lbs.; lettuce, 200 lbs.; fresh fruit, 1,200 lbs.; nuts, 300 lbs.; candy, 500 lbs.; pies, 200; ice cream, 40 gals.; cigars, 1,100; cigarettes, 1,100 pkgs.; coffee, 100 lbs.

At this point Grandma might well have exclaimed: "My gracious! Six hundred pounds of Irish potatoes! It would take a week to peel them!"

"How about that, Chief? Do you have any labor-saving devices in the galley?"

"Oh, yes," says Chief Jimmy. The potatoes are peeled by power peelers, of which we have two, each with a capacity of a hundred pound sack in approximately five minutes. But the boys dig out the eyes with paring knives in the good old-fashioned way. We also have eight navy standard oil-burning ranges and twelve steam boilers, each of sixty-gallon capacity, for vegetables and so forth. The meal is prepared under my direction by twenty ship's cooks and eight bakers. Fifty-five men serve it."

"Of course you serve a good quality of everything."

"Only the very best," says Chief Jimmy. "Besides the regular government inspection, all foodstuffs are again inspected at ship-side, and any offering that is not up to specifications goes right back!"

And there you have the story of a Christmas dinner aboard one of Uncle Sam's battleships.

© 1933, Western Newspaper Union.