All this military memorabilia reminds me of a favorite bit of trivia. Napoleon (An army marches on its stomach) Bonaparte sponsored a contest for a new way of preserving foods in quantity. He needed a way to feed the huge modern armies of his day. This lead to the development of canning, which became widespread on both sides of the English channel around 1810.

The fun part is that the can opener was not invented for another thirty years. Soldiers were expected to open their metal canisters of food with their bayonets.