Teddy Bears: The Universal Toy With A Surprising History
There are few toys that really stand up to the test of time, and teddy bears are one of those toys. Their universal popularity has continued uninterrupted for generations, and I imagine it will for many more. But stuffed toy bears have not always been part of our toy collections. They were born in the early Twentieth century, after an unfortunate sequence of events that you may find surpising as the origin of a children's toy.
Teddy bears got their named from US President Theodire Roosevelt, as "Teddy" is the short familiar version of the name "Theodore". In 1902, President Roosevelt attended a hunting trip with the governor of Mississippi along with a number of others. During this trip they had a bear-hunting competition, and everybody had killed a bear aside from Roosevelt. Some members of Roosevelt's entourage tried to help him win the competition by capturing and subduing a bear, then summoning Roosevelt to come shoot it. But he refused to shoot the bear himself, feeling that this violated the spirit of the competition since he himself did not capture the bear. But the bear had been badly injured during its capture, prompting Roosevelt to order it be put down.
The story of course became big news, and was reproduced in a political cartoon in the Washington Post. Toy designer Morris Michtom saw the media coverage and had an immediate inspiration to create a new toy based on the incident. He capitalized on the media coverage by placing his new stuffed bear toys in his shop window with a sign that said "Teddy's Bear". The bears instantly skyrocketed to the heights of popularity, inspiring Michtom to increase the scale of his business by starting the Ideal Novelty and Toy Company. Around 1906, many copycat companies had begun producing similar items, and they became the biggest toy craze the world had ever seen up until that point.
Over a century later, teddy bears are still the most widely cherished toy that exists, beloved by children and adults alike all around the globe. It probably seems bizarre that such a groteque incident sparked the beginning of such a massive craze for cute stuffed children's toys, but maybe the happy feelings that teddy bears have brought to people everywhere have made something good out of that tragic event.
