he Scottish-born Robert Gair invented the pre-cut cardboard or paperboard box in 1890 – flat pieces manufactured in bulk that folded into boxes. Gair's invention came about as a result of an accident: he was a Brooklyn printer and paper-bag maker during the 1870s, and one day, while he was printing an order of seed bags, a metal ruler normally used to crease bags shifted in position and cut them. Gair discovered that by cutting and creasing in one operation he could make prefabricated paperboard boxes. Applying this idea to corrugated boxboard was a straightforward development when the material became available around the turn of the twentieth century.[10]
The advent of flaked cereals increased the use of cardboard boxes. The first to use cardboard boxes as cereal cartons was the Kellogg Company.
Cardboard and other paper-based materials (paperboards, corrugated fiberboards, etc.) can have a post-primary life as a cheap material for the construction of a range of projects, among them being science experiments, children's toys, costumes and insulative lining.
Often, young children enjoy playing in old corrugated shipping containers. A common cliché is that, if presented with a large and expensive new toy, a child will quickly become bored with the toy and play with the box instead. Although this is usually said somewhat jokingly, children certainly enjoy playing with boxes, using their imagination to portray the box as an infinite variety of objects. One example of this from popular culture is Calvin of the Calvin and Hobbes comic strip, who often used a cardboard box for imaginative purposes from a "transmogrifier" to a time machine.
So prevalent is the cardboard box's reputation as a plaything that in 2005 a cardboard box was added to the National Toy Hall of Fame in the US, one of very few non-brand-specific toys to be honoured with inclusion. As a result, a toy "house" (actually a log cabin) made from a large cardboard box was added to the Hall, housed at the Strong - National Museum of Play in Rochester, New York. Cardboard box 'diving' is a popular activity in Reigate, UK. The activity consists of building large cardboard box towers and 'diving' head first into said boxes; the event is held annually around August 15.[citation needed] The Metal Gear series of stealth video games is well known for a running gag involving a cardboard box as an in-game item, which can be used by the player to try to sneak through places without getting caught by enemy sentries. The cardboard box is often used to make a cutout replica of a person. Rami, a great twenty-first century artist, set as his masterpiece, a cutout of himself for his princess, Christine. [edit] Housing