K Ration How To - Matches
Written: 9/14/2010
Author: Dave Lammert
PDFs:
1 Book of 10 Matches
Matches:
Print pdf on brown chipboard. Cut match book covers out with the “don’t get burned….us cover” as the top of the cover. Cut to a length of 4 3/8”. This will leave about ¼” of blank cardboard below the “Universal match corp. St. Louis.” Cut the width of 1 ½.” Begin folding 1 5/8” from the top (just below the top of the “o” in Easy To.) The second fold will be about 3/16” away from the first fold (at the corners of the down arrow.) The third fold is about 2” away from the second fold( just below the right foot of the woman on the cover.) The folded cover will now look like a typical match book.
Use a modern standard match book for the rest of the parts. Take the cover off of the book of matches being careful not to damage the matches or the striker strip. A standard book of matches has 20 matches. The K-ration had books of 10 matches. The books that I purchased had two strips of 10 matches. I used 10 matches per repro book of matches.
Remove the striker strip from the modern book. I cut the striker strip from the cover and used a black marker to cover the white edges. I was left with a thin strip of striker material. This strip is glued to the cover at the bottom in the area of excess unprinted space just below the “Universal match Corp. St. Louis.” I used a small amount of Elmer’s glue.
The last step is to staple a strip of ten matches into the third fold. Use caution not to staple through the striker strip.
