Friday September 9th is TEDDY BEAR DAY

Today is Teddy Bear Day. Teddy Bear’s all over the world are special friends for their children and sometimes their adults. Teddie’s make us feel secure in an otherwise insecure world. He’s lovable a companion and a comforter.

As we become adults, some find it difficult to give up our teddy bears, I know I do! To be honest there is no reason for me to give up my Teddy Bears in fact I have to admit to having a small collection.. I consider it perfectly fine to keep our teddy bears around all our lives. In fact my McFee is an incredibly talented Teddy – it seems he can read and play the piano! While Bertie gathers everyone together for a Saturday night story… I would never have believed it, if a friend had not crept up on Mcfee and snapped this photograph late one night when she noticed a light shinning from under the guest room door. Although McFee can read he doesn’t seem to be able to talk but my friend assures me he thoroughly enjoyed the book…

HAVE A HAPPY TEDDY BEAR DAY

McFee reading Tails Carried High

The History of Teddy Bears
Teddy bears have been around since 1902. The teddy bear came to being when President Theodore Roosevelt refused to shot a black bear held captive by his hunting party. Also worth noting is that President Roosevelt’s refusal to shoot this captive bear became a very popular political cartoon by Cliff Barryman. A Brooklyn shopkeeper was inspired by the cartoon. The shopkeeper then asked President Rosevelt his permission to name a toy bear “Teddy”. Thus became the creation of the teddy bear.

It is also worth noting that the teddy bear was born in Germany between 1902 and 1903.The first teddy bears did not have cuddly faces or smiles, in fact, the first teddy bears had expressions which could best be described as stoic. Teddy bears were also quite stiff, the bendable arms and legs and soft, plush bodies came much later. Now teddy bears are still the number one item to give babies as their first toy, the prize to win your girl on your first date, and most importantly, the toy of choice for law enforcement to give to children in sad, unsafe situations to help them calm down and feel safe.The market for collectible teddy bears has seen significant growth in the last several years. A collectible teddy bear is very different than the typical store bought teddy that you might give a child. The industry defines collectible teddy bears as hard, not floppy, and fully jointed (meaning arms, legs, and head are movable). The artists however, also determine collectibles. Steiff teddy bears and others have a very high collectible value.

McFee playing the Piano

For more information on Teddy bears, visit http://www.TeddyBearsInfo.com

Why Do We Love Stuffed Animals and Teddy Bears? From www.bustill.blogspot.com

We all have toys in our pasts that make us smile just to think of the joy we got from playing with them. For many of us, it was a favorite stuffed animal that we could hold onto for reassurance. When we woke up in the dark or had to have a shot at the doctor’s or when we were tired, that bear or other stuffed animal was a friend who never deserted us. Even when we were “too old” to carry our little friend around with us, our teddy bears often waited on our beds and got picked up as soon as we came home from school. Some of us still have our stuffed animals and a few of us even still have them on our beds. It’s reassuring to hold onto a piece of our past when we’re stressed or life gets us down. No matter how badly the world treats us, our little stuffed friend will always be there for us. After a childhood’s worth of hugging and being carried around, our teddy bear may be a bit bedraggled, but there’s a lifetime of love inside that soft keepsake. There are memories of birthday parties and bouts with childhood diseases and rainy afternoons when you couldn’t play outside and none of your friends could come over.

Today, children still love stuffed animals. Often, the first toy an infant plays with is a stuffed animal bought especially for him or her by a fond relative. It isn’t long before little hands are reaching out for this interesting shape in their crib or playpen, and cuddling it to help them get to sleep. A friendship is formed, a bond that will last into childhood and help the baby and then the child through teething, tough times and the many disappointments of growing up. But why do people love stuffed animals and when did they start being such a big part of our lives?

Saturday Night Story

It’s likely that people have always fashioned soft toys for their children and the first ones were probably just rude representations of animals or people and filled with straw, grass or dry beans. There is evidence that Egyptian and Mesopotamian cultures had something similar to stuffed toys, although it’s unclear what they were used for. They’re pictured in tomb paintings and may have been used in religious rites as well as for children’s toys. We do know that as far back as the Middle Ages, stuffed animals were used in religious plays to depict biblical animals. It’s not unlikely that children also played with these stuffed animals.
After the Industrial Revolution, stuffed toys became more common and with the advent of the middle class, more people could afford them. Wealthy merchants, bankers and mill owners bought them and less well-off parents copied them by buying cheaper versions for their children. The most famous stuffed animal, the teddy bear, appeared simultaneously in Germany and America.
In America, the teddy bear was based on a cartoon which depicted President Theodore Roosevelt refusing to shoot a leashed bear. He had gone to Mississippi to settle a border dispute and his hosts had tied a bear up so that he could shoot it. Roosevelt, an avid hunter, considered this very unsporting and said so. The caption reads, “Drawing the line in Mississippi” and referred both to the bear and the border dispute. It immediately caught the public’s fancy and so did the stuffed bear that Rose and Morris Michtom made was in honour of the President’s actions.
The Michtom’s bear sat up, unlike previous toy bears which had stood on all fours and looked fierce. Their bear looked friendly and cuddly and when they put it in the window of their candy store with a sign reading, “Teddy’s Bear”, it attracted a lot of attention. It was so popular and sold so well that the Michtoms joined with the Butler Brothers to start the Ideal Toy and Novelty Company – the first teddy bear company in the US.

A 1902 political cartoon in The Washington Post spawned the Teddy bear name

Coincidentally, also in 1902, the Steiff toy company produced a prototype bear. They had been making stuffed animals and the owner’s nephew was copying zoo animals when he began to focus on a bear cub there. At a toy show in 1903, few of the European wholesalers were interested in the Steiff bear, but an American buyer realized the potential for success in America where teddy bears, as they were now called, were selling like Cabbage Patch kids or Tickle Me Elmos have in recent years. He brought the Steiff bear to the US where it sold like hotcakes. Soon, everyone from society matrons to infants had teddy bears, often carrying them with them and having their photos taken with them. Other companies added teddy bears to their stuffed animal line and the craze spread to England and finally Europe. With the exception of the World War I years, handmade, well-crafted teddy bears’ popularity never waned, until the 50’s, when mass-produced synthetic versions flooded the market.

For the next two decades, teddy bears were just another cheap import for the most part, with more upscale teddy bears as only a small segment of the toy business. However, in the 1970’s, that changed when a well-known English actor, Peter Bull, wrote a book about his lifelong love for teddy bears. Other books followed and finally, in 1974, Beverly Port, a famous doll maker, introduced a bear at a doll show. It was a hit and soon adults began to collect teddy bears as they collected dolls. People searched for the teddy bear models that they’d loved as children. The old, well-made handcrafted teddy bears began to appear on the collectible market and companies began to make new premium teddy bears the way they had when teddy bears were first popular.

Now, whether they’re collectibles or toys, there are many lines of high-quality teddy bears and stuffed animals. Consumers demand quality and Gund, Steiff, Ganz and many of the best brands are featured at online companies and in the best upscale stores. Newcomers to the stuffed animal field like Webkinz and Neopets are very popular, as are Beanie Babies by Ty. Whether these will stand the test of time like teddy bears have remains to be seen, but they’re very popular right now and will be featured on many a 2007 Toy Hot List. As we all know, Hot Lists are fickle and the toys on them change from year to year. Teddy bears and other stuffed animals, however, have stood the test of time and will continue to delight their owners as long as there are children who need a cuddly friend.