Web Site News

Site Map

Contact Us

Home

Dan Bankhead can talk more than two hours about his lunch boxes.

The 47-year-old Kirkwood resident, who is a mail carrier by day and a lunch-box collector by night, started his hobby three years ago. The 100 or so lunch boxes he owns date from the 1950s to mid-1980s. They are in a rotating collection because Bankhead buys and sells them regularly through the online auction company eBay.

"I probably couldn't find five other collectors in the Triple Cities," Bankhead said. "eBay has that way of having a niche market."

Bankhead began his collection after he found his grade school Beverly Hillbillies-themed lunch box in his mother's basement. He listed it on eBay and was surprised when it sold for $110.

Three years and countless lunch boxes later, Bankhead has been able to purchase a backyard pool and a garden tractor with his profits. He shows no signs of slowing down: The next purchase planned from his lunch box profits is a new digital camera. Bankhead also hopes to eventually expand his efforts by participating in antique and appraising shows in Greater Binghamton.

For more than 50 years, lunch boxes accompanied children to school, evolving from a simple container to an advertisement for popular culture.

"Anyone who was anyone could be found on a box," said Bryan Los, owner and operator of LunchBoxPad.com, a Web site devoted to the lunch box hobby.

That includes Hopalong Cassidy, Tom Corbett: Space Cadet, Trigger, The Beatles, Superman, Popeye, Mickey Mouse, Dr. Seuss, Bullwinkle, Sesame Street, Pink Panther, Bee Gees, Star Trek, Jetsons ... the list goes on and on.

"The people I hear from love to collect boxes because they not only have become works of art in their own right, but they represent a slice of pop culture, snapshots of a time that most people have fond recollections of -- their childhood," Los said.

Some of Bankhead's favorite lunch boxes feature the A-Team, Dukes of Hazzard and Archie characters.

But all of the pieces in Bankhead's collection are ultimately for sale, he said, except for one. Because he's been a letter carrier for 15 years, he is especially fond of his U.S. Mail lunch box dating from 1969.

"There's just something cool about them," he said. "I've always been infatuated with Hollywood culture, and there are a lot of memories there when you look at them."

One of Bankhead's lunch boxes, a Fireball XL5 box from 1964, is worth around $350. To compare, lunch boxes from the mid-'80s -- say Holly Hobby, Strawberry Shortcake and the Care Bears, for example, -- are worth about $40, if they are in good condition with the matching Thermos bottle.

Other lunch boxes can fetch quite a price; Bankhead's seen some sell on eBay for up to $3,000.

But he has his limits on how much he's willing to pay for a box, and he constantly consults the Collector's Guide to Lunchboxes. It contains photos, dates, rarity ratings and approximate values of almost all the lunch boxes ever manufactured.

Bankhead keeps his lunch box funds separate from his family's regular household account, and he also restores boxes and sells them at a higher cost.

"I'm always looking for the same model in better condition or complete with the Thermos, so I buy to resell," Bankhead said, adding that his goal is to have every piece in mint or near-mint condition. He also said he spends only 20 minutes a day on the computer checking the available stock.

"I check in the the morning while I drink my coffee to see what's ending and what's just arrived," he said. "This is a very limited but hungry market."

Comments or Suggestions?