My tour of duty in the Air Force ran from Oct 1960 to Oct 1964. The first meal I had was SOS. I looked at that stuff and thought somebody had puked on the toast. Didn't taste bad and as time went on got to like the stuff. Meals were fair at Lackland but as has been said, 'Tastes like schit but you can live on it." Tech school was a Chanute in Illynoise and the food was much worse than at Lackland.
Finally got my first duty station, Nellis AFB in Las Vegas Nevada. I wouldn't wish that place to even my worst enemy. GIs were not treated like citizens, only something to be tolerated as long as the spent their meager paychecks in town. For what was supposed to be a show base, food was only fair as the best and worse most of the time. Not surprised as VIPs probably ate at the officer's mess. During mid 1962, IIRC the food really got not bad but totally terrible. Got so bad I reused to eat as the chow hall. On of my buddies finked me out to the CO and he called me into his office for a little chat. He ordered me to eat at the chow hall. I refused. I'd been on a hunger strike for three days when my money ran out. He did ask why and told him the food had gotten so bad I could not eat it. Come lunch time he ordered me to accompany him to the chow hall and he went through the line with me. he saw what I was complaining about and took the tray of "food" and went to the base commander's office requesting and immediate interview. The meal FWIW was liver and onions and the liver was green in color and had a bad smell. Dunno what transpired at that meeting but in less that a week, all the civilian cooks and KPs were fired and AK Officers, NCOs and KPs were all now AP personnel.
The best meals at Nellis were not at Nellis but up the road at Indian Springs gunnery range. We litrally ate steak every day cooked to order. Springs had a small crew but was supposed to be staffed with up to 250 people. Usually less that 100 most of the time. We ate good.
While at Springs our weather crew which consisted of my buddy and I were part of a project where C-rats were packed into those droppable wing tanks and dropped as low level at the slowest speed possible. Guess it wasn't slow enough because in five days they made five drops and not one tank survived to keep the C-rats intact. Most were dated 1942/43 with some as early as 1941. They were for the most part still good to eat and some were very good. The best was labeled pork steak and I liked that one. Cigarets were in full 20 smoke packs and the Lucky Strikes were still in the green packs. I opened one up and the tobacco just dribbled on out so they got thrown away. I wonder what those green LS packs would be worth to a collector today.
From Nellis I finished my tour at Osan Korea and most of the time the food was pretty darn good. Again though, he best of the best was when I got to do a three month TDY at Koon-ni range, not too far from Suwon. Again a base supposed to be manned by a compliment 250 to 300 people and my and a buddy plus the Korean cook, houseboy and bottle washer, just the three of up. Needless to say we ate good. There some other fringe bennies better left unsaid. Let's just say that was one TDY duty I hated to see come to an end. Come to think of it, I hate to see that tour of duty come to and.
Paul B.
