1972 is a key year in the history of American lunch boxes. This is an important year because this is the supposed year the steel lunch box died.
In 1971-72, a concerned group of parents decided that metal lunch boxes could actually be used as weapons in school-yard brawls. With petitions signed, they marched all the way to the Florida State Legislature, and demanded “safety legislation” be passed. It eventually was passed, and other counties in Florida, and even other states adopted this legislation.
The migration to plastic was probably nearing anyway, and probably was as much a factor in the stoppage of metal lunch boxes as any law could have been. This is not to say that plastic quickly killed metal production. From the early plastic boxes in 1972, they stood in the shadow of metal boxes until 1987. 39% of all lunch box production from 1972–1987 was steel.
By the time the 1980s came, lunch box sales were still strong, but they were waning. Many popular licenses were around during this time, including Pac-Man, GI Joe, Dukes of Hazzard, The A-Team, Strawberry Shortcake, Knight Rider, and other characters.
As the decade drew towards the end, lunch box manufacturers simply stopped producing new boxes for the back-to-school season. Generally, it is accepted that Rambo, produced by KST, was the last lunch box of the golden era (1950–1987) to be sold. Lunch box production did not stop, but companies now moved to plastic and vinyl as a means of making lunch boxes. These boxes were generally solid colored with a label on one side and no other decoration beyond the thermos.
Who else would have been pissed if they’d known that they got a plastic lunch box, as opposed to the cool metal ones their older siblings had, all because of some goody-goody Tipper Gore-esque Mom who ruined it for us all? Especially since now-days the Hipster scene-kids are living our steel lunchbox dreams, with their Invader Zim or Emily the Strange lunch boxes.