packaging as content

June 23, 2009

Another baby found in a Timberland shoe box

Baby shoe box photos from KidsDesignerWear-UK. (This is not the box in which the baby girl was found in Hempstead, and is only shown here for illustration purposes & for flat-footed irony.)

Yep. This is the second time I’m quoting a Daily News story about a baby in a Timberland box. (The earlier story was from September of 2007. See: Packaging and Moral Turpitude.) 

The girl was less than a day old when she was discovered by a man who heard a noise and peeked inside a Timberland work boots box around 9 p.m. Sunday in Hempstead, L.I.

Baby, less than a day old, found in shoebox in lobby of Long Island apartment building
The NY Daily News, 6/22/09

And from the NY Post:

A newborn baby girl was found alive in a Timberland shoebox in the entrance to a Long Island apartment building, police said today…

A breathing hole had been cut in the middle of the lid.

Poor Timberland. Some news reports just say “shoe box,” but most of the reportage makes a point of including this key, brand-name detail. Is this just to give the story verisimilitude?  Or is it a commentary on the mother’s values? As if to say: “Look, she can afford to buy expensive Timberland boots, but she can’t afford to take care of her child.”

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