From Tom Blackburn's book "The Jolly Rogers":
"The last truly important piece of business before our Januaray departure was the headache we had given ourselves by amassing 148 cases of beer in the giant Quonset hut I shared with Rog Hedrick. How in the world were we going to get the cache form Espirtu to Bougainville?
We had had ample luck during our Ondongo tour at transporting the odd case of hard booze. Typically, camoflaged cases would be marked "Electronics Equipment -- Fragile," and we got them delivered with no difficulty. But 148 cases of beer was too much to even think of masking with that scheme, and we knew that sending it aboard a ship would result in a total loss.
At virtually the last minute, our great Supply Corps outwitter, Lt(jg) Hal Jackson, arrived on my doorstep with a catbird grin -- and a solution.
"Skipper! Rog! I got it!"
What is this jaygee doing here? "Got what?"
"How to get the beer to Bougainville!"
I was all attention. "Bless your bones, you crook. How?"
With rather studied indignation, Hal stared me down. "I am not a crook!" (insert: I got an impression of him doing this in a "Tricky Dick" voice when I read that. LOL - A.G.) But the catbird grin came on again. "I'm just alert!"
"So give!"
"Well, the most planes we've ever had in one flight in the forward area is twenty-four. And we did alright. Right?"
"Hal, press on!"
He did, with great fervency. "The flight going up to Bougainville will be a whole squadron. We'll never in God's world get jumped. But if we do, wouldn't four guns per plane and two hundred rounds per gun be plenty?"
"Jackson," I beamed as I saw his ploy, "I apologize for calling you a crook. You're a bloody genius! I'll have Duke write you up for a Legion of Merit."
That very day -- within minutes, actually -- we were out on the flightline figuring out the best and safest way to stow the beer cases in the huge ammunition cans. It was clear after a quick trial that we had room for all 148 cases.
On January 24 we flew the last hour to Bougainville at 25,000 feet. As we shut down on our hardstands at our base, each pilot solemnly handed a new church key to his Marine plane captain and bade him fetch and open two ice-cold cans of beer from one of the ammo cans in the wings. What an attention getter!"
