Since developing the all-steel vacuum flask in 1913, the Stanley company has cultivated a particularly rugged, if not decidedly masculine, image. Per a 2012 release from the company, which was originally founded by William Stanley Jr., an American physicist born in Brooklyn, their thermoses appeal to “a 30-year-career veteran policeman” and “a retired Army soldier” just as much as they did to the B-17 pilots who used them during World War II.
There are reports that Stanley bottles have been used by ranchers to collect and transport bull semen, by members of Everest expeditions to keep tea warm, and by medical professionals who needed a portable, temperature-controlled option for delivering human organs in times of crises. If we’re dealing in clichés, these thermoses belong in the lunchbox of a guy taking a break from the assembly line or in the hands of a construction worker.
