Did you know how some Marines made their own ice cream in World War II?

Small luxuries can go a long way, especially to soldiers stuck in distant, poorly supplied tropical locations. A cold beer, some ice cream, or even just cold water can really lift morale, but what can you do when you don't even have a refrigerator? They say nobody is as inventive (or dangerous) as a bored Marine, and one such World War II Marine came to the help of his comrades during the two-month Battle of Peleliu in the Pacific in late 1944.

Joseph Hunter Reinburg, Marine aviator and commander of Marine fighter squadron VMF-122, decided to get ice cream for his men, who were disgruntled because they were stuck on dive bombing and strafing missions without the prospect of proper air combat. He had his ground crew cut off the ends of an old drop tank, put wire in the new holes to keep the contents inside, and install an access panel through which he inserted an ammo bucket for .50 caliber machine gun (Read our earlier article) rounds, filled with a mixture of canned milk and cocoa powder. He then took off on a mission logged as an "oxygen system test" and flew his F4U Corsair (Read our earlier article) above Japanese positions while the enemy wasted valuable flak shells that couldn't reach his altitude. By the time he landed 35 minutes later, the air passing through the tank through the holes chilled the liquid mixture. The men were happy to get at it, but Reinburg was dissatisfied as the proximity of the hot engine prevented it from really congealing into a cream.

His second experiment, a "supercharger test flight," had two ammo boxes strapped under his wing. This time, the contents froze properly, but Reinburg still wasn't happy, as the result was too flaky and icelike for his tastes.

Third time was a charm. He had the ground crew insert a contraption into the boxes. As the plane flew, the wind turned a propeller at the front of the box, and the motion was transmitted to a churning mechanism, inside, creating perfect ice cream.

"Operation Freeze" continued in secret, until Group Operations Officer Caleb Bailey got wind of it. The enraged officer quickly made a call to one of Reinburg's men, telling him “Listen, goddammit, you guys aren’t fooling me. I’ve got spies. You tell [Reinburg] I’m coming over there tomorrow and get my ration.”

On a historical note, this wasn't the only time American air crews made ice cream. Heavy bomber crews in Europe sometimes used the vibrations of the plane's engines to chur the ingredients into a fine cream, and one unit used P-47s to make vanilla ice cream with canned fruit.

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