|
Toys & Teddy Bears
The teddy bear is a stuffed toy bear. It is an enduring, traditional form of stuffed animal, often serving the purpose of comforting children. In recent times, some teddy bears have become expensive collector's items. more...
Home
Art
Basketry
Bead Art
Candle & Soap Making
Ceramics, Pottery
Crafts Wholesale Lots
Crocheting
Cross Stitch
Completed Cross Stitch
Cross Stitch Fabric
Cross Stitch Floss
Cross Stitch Frames
Cross Stitch Kits
Angels, Cherubs
Animals & Insects
Baby
Buildings & Villages
Celestial
Characters
Fantasy, Fairies
Flowers, Gardens
Food & Kitchen
Holidays
Landscapes & Seascapes
Mixed Lots
Nautical, Lighthouse
Oriental
Other Cross Stitch Kits
People
Religious & Cultural
Samplers
Seasons, Weather
Special Occasions
Toys & Teddy Bears
Cross Stitch Magazines
Cross Stitch Patterns
Other Cross Stitch
Decorative, Tole Painting
Drawing
Embroidery
Fabric
Fabric Embellishments
Floral Crafts
Framing & Matting
General Art & Craft Supplies
Glass Art Crafts
Handcrafted Items
Kids Crafts
Knitting
Lacemaking, Tatting
Latch Rug Hooking
Leathercraft
Macramé
Metalworking
Mosaic
Needlepoint
Other Arts & Crafts
Painting
Paper Crafts & Origami
Quilting
Ribbon
Rubber Stamping & Embossing
Scrapbooking
Sewing
Shellcraft
Spinning
Upholstery
Wall Décor, Tatouage
Weaving
Woodworking
Yarn
Teddy bear collectors are known as arctophiles from the Greek words 'arcto' (bear) and 'philos' (lover).
History
The name Teddy Bear comes from one of American President Theodore Roosevelt's hunting trips to Mississippi. There were several other hunters competing, and most of them had already shot something. A suite of Roosevelt's attendants, lead by Holt Collier, cornered, clubbed, and tied to a willow tree an American Black Bear after a long exhausting chase with hounds. They called Roosevelt to the site and suggested he shoot it. He refused to shoot the bear himself, deeming this un-sportsmanlike, but instructed that the bear be killed to put it out of its misery, and it became the topic of a political cartoon by Clifford Berryman in The Washington Post on November 16, 1902. While the initial cartoon of an adult black bear lassoed by a white handler and a disgusted Roosevelt had symbolic overtones, later issues of that and other Berryman cartoons made the bear smaller and cuter. A Brooklyn store owner, Morris Michtom, saw the drawing of Roosevelt and the bear cub and was inspired to create a new toy. He created a little stuffed bear cub and put it in his shop window with a sign that read "Teddy's bear." The toys were an immediate success and Michtom founded the Ideal Novelty and Toy Co., which still exists today.
At the same time, in Germany the Steiff firm, unaware of Michtom's bear, produced a stuffed bear from Richard Steiff's designs. They exhibited the toy at the Leipzig Toy Fair in March 1903 and exported 3000 to the United States.
By 1906 manufacturers other than Michtom and Steiff had joined in and the craze for Teddy Bears was such that ladies carried them everywhere, children were photographed with them, and Roosevelt used one as a mascot in his bid for re-election.
American educator Seymour Eaton wrote the children's book series The Roosevelt Bears, while composer John Bratton wrote "The Teddy Bear Two Step" music which with Jimmy Kennedy's lyrics became the song "The Teddy Bears' Picnic".
Read more at Wikipedia.org
|
|