History Page
A Little Bit Of Teddy Bear History. The Teddy Bear, got it’s name from Theodore (Teddy) Roosevelt, the 26th President of the United States. |
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On the 14th November 1902, President Roosevelt was at Mississippi to settle a border dispute between Mississippi and Louisiana. While there, he attended a bear hunt, during the hunt he came across a wounded young bear which had just killed a hunting dog, President Roosevelt ordered a ‘mercy killing’, to put the animal out of its misery. The Washington Post ran an editorial cartoon created by the political cartoonist Clifford K. Berryman which was called ‘Drawing The Line In Mississippi’. |
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'Drawing The Line In Mississippi' (Clifford K. Berryman) |
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President Theodore Roosevelt |
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At first Berryman drew the bear as a fierce animal but due to its popularity it was later re-drawn as a cuddly cub. The story also changed slightly. The President failed to make a kill at the hunt so his hosts caught and tethered a bear. This they presented to the President as a sitting target. Naturally he refused and was immortalised as saying, ’Spare the bear! I will not shoot a tethered animal.’ |
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To commemorate this story, Morris Michtom who owned a small novelty and candy store in Brooklyn, New York placed in his window a toy bear his wife Rose had made. This bear appeared for the first time, cub like, sweet and innocent. Michtom sent a bear off to Roosevelt and asked his permission if he could use the ‘teddy’ bear name. Roosevelt agreed and the idea took off. Michtom and a company called Butler Brothers began to mass produce them and within a year Michtom had started his own company called the Ideal Novelty and Toy Company. |
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Roosevelt as a Rough Rider with a bear cub (Clifford K. Berryman) |
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Strangely enough, on the other side of the Atlantic Ocean, Margarete Steiff a disabled German seamstress, who worked with a soft toy factory in Giengen had added a soft plush bear to the Steiff catalogue and sold 3,000 to American in 1903. Between 1903 and the first World War, Steiff had sold millions of bears, with their trademark button in the left ear to America, Germany and Britian as the teddy bear took over as the latest toy craze. |
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Margarete Steiff |
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