Get Sleepy: Sleep meditation and stories - The Sleepy History of Teddy Bears

Episode Date: March 6, 2024

Narrator: Thomas Jones 🇬🇧 Writer: Jessica Miller ✍️ Sound design: crickets 🌾 Includes mentions of: Animals, Hunting, Shopping, History, US History, Americana, Nostalgia, Children, Literature & Literary History, Art History, Bears.  Welcome back, sleepyheads. Tonight, we'll hear the story of that familiar cuddly toy – the teddy bear. For a humble toy, it has a long and fascinating history that we’ll delve into this evening. 😴 Watch, listen and comment on this episode on the Get Sleepy YouTube channel. And hit subscribe while you're there! Enjoy various playlists of our stories and meditations on our Slumber Studios Spotify profile. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Get Sleepy is a production of Slumber Studios and is made possible thanks to the generous support of our sponsors and premium members. If you'd like to listen, add free and access weekly bonus episodes, extra long stories and our entire back catalogue, you can try out premium free for 7 days by following the link in the episode notes. Now, a quick word from our sponsors. This episode is brought to you by Tressame. Once silky smooth hair that's still full

of natural movement, the Tressame Carrotin Smooth Weightless Collection is your simple solution. This new collection features a wide range of products from nourishing shampoo and conditioner to lightweight heat protectants, and a silky smooth serum for a sleek finish. Wave goodbye to Frizz and say hello to three days of smooth hair with a Tressame Keratin Smooth Weightless Collection. Visit Tressame.com to learn more. See yourself buying a home one day? Do future you a favor? Open a Questrade first home savings account and help that future come faster.

The FHSA is a tax-free account where all your investment gains are yours to keep and put towards your first home. With Questrade, you can open an FHSA online. No bank appointment needed. It's easy and only takes a few minutes. The sooner you get started, the more time your down payment has to grow. Open an account today at Questrade.com. Good evening and welcome to Get Sleepy, where we listen, we relax, and we get sleepy. My name's Thomas and I'm so pleased you're here to join me for tonight's story. In this episode, I'm going to tell you the story of that familiar, cuddly toy, the teddy bear. For a humble toy, it has a long and fascinating history that we'll delve into this evening. Thanks to Jessica for writing this lovely sleepy history, and a big thanks to our listener

Nathaniel who requested this story. I really hope you enjoy it. Let me ask you, how does a completely ad-free Get Sleepy listening experience sound to you? And how about access to nearly 700 full-length stories and meditations, including dozens of extra-long episodes and series stitches? That all sounds pretty good, I hope, and you can enjoy all of that with a Get Sleepy Premium subscription, which is the best way to listen and to support the show. As well as everything I've already mentioned, every single Thursday we release an exclusive bonus episode for our premium subscribers. Like tomorrow, when Eric will be back to read a story

called A Little Piece of Family History, about a man reminiscing on family life while he paints. The first seven days of a Get Sleepy premium subscription are free, and you can cancel any So now, get nice and cozy in your bed. Thank you all so much. So now, get nice and cozy in your bed, cocooning yourself in the warmth of your covers. I'm hoping that tonight's story will be popular with listeners of all different ages. No matter what age we are, we can all appreciate the safety and comfort we feel when we get into bed and make ourselves nice and snug. nice and snug. I know that sometimes if you're struggling with sleep a little, bedtime canbring about a slight sense of anxiety. You might feel a bit of pressure around trying to get to sleep, but there's no need to feel that way. Just know that sleep will come your way when the time is right. It's not something you can force, so take any pressure you're putting on yourself, out of the situation. For now, think of a time when you were young, and perhaps you had a teddy bear of your own,

or another cuddly toy or comforter. Remind yourself of how it felt, every time you had that source of comfort and safety, by your side. And as you settle in to a deep and satisfying rest tonight, allow those feelings to come to the forefront of your mind. You might find that tonight's story conjures some nostalgia and feelings of warmth and safety you may have felt when cuddling up to a familiar toy as a child. And if so, I want you to embrace that feeling and hold it close to you as you relax.

So you're breathing, loosen any tension in your muscles and enjoy this opportunity to rest. Now, we're ready to hear all about the storied past of teddy bears, and how they became such a popular toy, and even a collector's item. This is where our story begins. Picture a teddy bear. You might think of the standard bear, curly yellow fur, a soft plush belly, jointed arms and legs attached to the body, and bright buttern eyes. Or perhaps there's a particular teddy bear that springs to mind for you. A teddy bear you have known since childhood for instance, with its fair or fabric worn in patches, with its own particular softness and smell. Just about everyone knows what a teddy bear is.

Most people grew up with one of their own. But unlike dolls or spinning tops or rocking horses, the teddy bear is a comparatively modern toy. The first teddy bears were produced at the turn of the 20th century. How, in the years that followed, did the teddy become such a ubiquitous, not to mention beloved, plaything? The best way to answer that question is to take you back in time, to a crisp November morning in 1902. We are in the forests of Mississippi, where then President of the United States Theodore Roosevelt is on an organized hunt for the black bear, native to the hardwood forests of the region. After having little success himself, a group of Rusefeld's aides capture a bear and bring the president to its location in the forest. But upon seeing the bear in person, Rusevelt has a turn of heart and refuses to

harm the poor creature. At the time, the story of Rusevelt's compassion to the bear, quickly spread through newspaper articles and political cartoons, and in particular, one drawing by the cartoonist Clifford Berryman. Berryman's drawing caught the eye of a man named Morris Miktham, while he was reading his copy of the Washington Post. Morris was a Russian Jewish immigrant who owned a penny candy store in Brooklyn, New York. He was struck with inspiration. He was struck with inspiration.

That evening, he and his wife Rose stayed up late. They fashioned a small toy bear out of a piece of plush velvet. Rose stitched on buttern eyes, a nose, and a slightly perturbed looking mouth to complete the bear's face. The mictims placed the bear in their shop window with a sign that read, Teddy's Bear. Teddy was one of Theodore Roosevelt's nicknames, and supposedly one that he hated. The customers at Morris and Rose's candy store quickly proved even more interested in the sweet stuffed animal in the window than they were in the gum drops and candid nuts for sale.

As customer after customer inquired about buying the little teddy. Morris and Rose knew they were on to a winning idea. Before they started producing teddy bears in earnest, though, they decided to ask President Roosevelt's permission. After all, they planned to market their creation with Roosevelt's nickname attached. They wrote the president a letter introducing their teddy bear and asking if he wouldn't mind lending the bear his name. As a politician, Roosevelt was known for his sound judgment. But in matters of stuffed toys, his judgement was off. While he happily agreed to lend the little toy bear his name, privately, he is said to have expressed his doubt that the toy would ever

take off. How wrong he was. Morris and Rose formed the ideal toy and novelty company in 1903 and began manufacturing more of Teddy's bears. The bears were an immediate sensation, and it wasn't long before the mictims left the candy business behind and dedicated themselves to making teddy bears full-time. Across the Atlantic Ocean, in Germany, a man named Richard Steiff was in the habit of making frequent visits to the Nilscher Zoo in Stuttgart. On every visit, he brought his sketchpad, pens and pencils, which he used to make incredibly detailed drawings of the animals there.

Animals like penguins, lions, leopards, and bears. Drawing was Richard's passion. He was a recent graduate of a national art school. But the drawings he made of these animals weren't purely done for his own pleasure. He brought the images back to his aunt Margareta, who also happened to be his employer at the Steiff toy company. Margareta Steiff was born in 1847 in Gingen, a small town in Germany's fairytale black forest. When she was just over one year old, she contracted polio. paralyzed both her legs and left her with constant pain in her right hand. But Margareta was determined to support herself.

She found she had a talent for playing the zither, a traditional stringed instrument, and was soon teaching others in her village to play too. She earned enough money teaching zither to purchase a sewing machine for herself. At the time, the sewing machine was a very recent invention. In fact, Margareta was the first person in her village to own one. With her sewing machine, Margarita began sewing felt underskirts, which were the latest word in women's fashion at the time. Her business thrived, and she was soon employing a small team. The felt offcuts left over from the underscouts were, as she found, perfect in both size and texture for making pin cushions. She gave out these pinkishens to friends and family, but more often than not, they were adopted by children as small, cuddly toys. So, Margareta turned her hand to toy making.

She loved fashioning small felt mice and elephants, and giving them out to the children in her life. little plush toys became so popular that Margareta decided to begin selling them. In the 1880s, she founded the Steiff Toy Company. At first, Stife made cuddly elephants and mice, as well as pull-along toys from metal or wood, including pull-along bears. But in 1897, when Margareta's nephew Richard joined the family farm, he encouraged Margareta to expand her selection of stuffed toys. He would spend hours at the zoo, sketching animals from every angle. do, sketching animals from every angle. Then together, he and his aunt would carefully build lifelike plush versions of the animals Richard had sketched.

In particular, the Steif Company became famous for their lifelike jointed limbs, all its fuzzy creatures boasted. And one of those creatures was a bear, based on the bears Richard had observed at the zoo. In 1903 Richard and Margareta exhibited their stuffed toys, including their bear at the Leipzig Toy Fair. But buyers didn't seem particularly interested in the Stifes offerings, and sales were disappointing. At the last minute though, an American businessman visiting the fair bought every last one of Stif's bears. He arranged for them to be shipped to America, where he planned to sell them in various department stores and toy shops. Steiff's shipment of bears would have arrived in the US at just the same time as Morris and

Rose Mictum's teddy bear was making such a splash. Soon, Stife and Mictum bears were available on the shelves of nearly every toy shop in America and Europe, not that they stayed on the shelves very long. The teddy bear was the latest must-have toy. In 1906, Stife officially began selling its bears under the name of Teddy Bear. By 1907, over one million teddy bears were being produced every year by the Steiff Company alone. Soon, the teddy bear's popularity. Henry and Agnes were the children of a silk match J.K. Farnell, John had produced pincushions and teacoses.

But after their father's death, Henry and Agnes expanded the offering to include soft toys made from luxurious fabrics. They decided to craft their own version of the teddy bear out of Mohair. Mohair is one of the wilds oldest textiles. It's woven from the super soft hairs of Angora goats. For centuries, Mohair was spun by hand. It was costly and labor intensive to produce. But in the early 20th century, fabric mills in England began to produce mohair at an industrial scale, making it far cheaper and more readily available. available. So, the Farnels crafted their teddy bear from the wonderfully soft and snuggly mohair. Like the teddy bears made by the mictims and the shtifes, the fennels teddy bear, first produced in 1908, was a runaway

success. In fact, by 1910, teddy bears were said to outnumber children in England. Soon, teddy bears began to feature in books, songs, and cinema. Perhaps the most famous literary teddy bear was the creation of author A. A. Milne, Winnie the Pooh. The friendly yellow bear who stars in Milne's whimsical books and in a host of cartoons and movies based on them, was inspired by a real teddy bear belonging to Meln's only child, his son Christopher Robin. The bear was purchased from the famous Harrods department store in London as a gift for Christopher's first birthday. As a young boy, Christopher was very taken with a brown bear that had its home at London Zoo.

Before it came to the zoo, the bear was a mascot for the Winnipeg Regiment of the Canadian Army. Christopher Robin decided to call his own bear Winnie after the bear at the zoo. Christopher Robin used to take Winnie, along with a host of other stuffed creatures, on adventures into the woodlands of Ashdown Forest, near the family's home of Cotford Farm in Sussex. Ashdown Forest is the inspiration for the magical Hundred Acre Wood, where, in Milne's books, Christopher Robin, Winnie and other characters like to go searching for honey and heffa-lumps and everything in between. The real teddy bear that inspired the character of Winnie the Pooh now belongs to the New the toys who inspired Eeyore, Piglet, Tigger, and Kanga. Winnie the Pooh first appeared in print in 1924.

In that same decade, a German confectioner named Hans Regal invented an equally famous and popular tribute to the teddy bear, the gummy bear. Regal's sweet company, Haribo, specialized in making, chewy candies from a mixture of sugar and gum Arabic. These were quite a novelty at a time when most candies were hard. Initially, Regal's bear-shaped soft sweets were quite large and lifelike. Later, Regal modified the size and features of his candy bears to make the smaller, teddy bear-shaped confection that is still so popular today. As of 2013, Haribo was manufacturing approximately 100 million gummy bears every day. While teddy bears were produced and marketed as a children's toy, many adults found themselves

enchanted by them too. Perhaps the most famous adult to own a teddy bear was the poet John Betchamon, whose teddy bear archibald accompanied him wherever he went. In fact, Betchamon took Archibald with him to Oxford as an undergraduate student. Also at the time, was the novelist Evelyn Moore. Betjeman and Archibald were certainly a source of inspiration for the character of Sebastian Flight in Moore's novel Brideshead Revisited. Sebastian is a notorious dandy among his class at Oxford, known for his flamboyant style of dress and his many eccentricities. One of his most notorious quirks is that he carries his chartered teddy bear alawicious everywhere he goes. file, someone who collects or is very fond of teddy bears.

Another well-known arctophile is Peter Bull, a character actor who appeared in classic movies, such as The African Queen and Doctor Strange Love. For decades, teddy bears were considered purely a child's plaything. Peter Ball was a passionate collector of them, and his 1969 book Bear With Me legitimized teddy bears as a serious collectible for adults. These days, rare or historically significant teddy bears can sell at auction for upwards of $100,000. A steif titanic bear, one of only 600 made by the German firm to commemorate the tragedy sinking recently sold for $136,000. Bear Collecting reached a new level in the 1990s when the tire company released a range of nine squishy, poseable, stuffed animals called beanie babies. One of the most famous was Cubby the Bear. Thanks to the Thai strategy of releasing only limited runs of each beanie, the toys soon became hot collectibles.

But it didn't stop there. The height of the beanie baby craze coincided with the launch new web platform for buying, selling and trading. That was called eBay. Canny resellers listed sought after beanies on eBay and enthusiastic fans paid far beyond retail price to get their hands on the toy they wanted most. At the height of the beanie bubble, five dollar beanies were routinely being resold for thousands of dollars. of dollars. Especially rare beanie babies, like the Princess Diana commemorative beanie, were valued at over $100,000. But like most market bubbles, the beanie bubble soon burst. As resale prices went down, collectors who'd been holding on to the highly valued plush toys flooded the resale market, devaluing their collectibles even further. While the beanie baby fat has well and truly passed, some rare beanies still command a hefty resale price, like the cubby bear, who who is still worth about a thousand dollars to collectors today. The famous children's author, Michael Bond, may have been a bit of an arctophile too.

The story goes that he was Christmas shopping for his wife when he saw a single bear on a department store's toy shelf. The lonely looking bear tugged at his heartstrings and he ended up giving it to his wife for Christmas. Soon Bond was inspired to write a story based on the teddy, about a bear with a ponchon for marmalade who hailed from Peru, but was forced to leave his home when it was destroyed. He arrived in London, where he was found at Paddington by the Brown family, who named him after the railway station. Paddington's endearing clumsiness and sweet nature

made him an instant hit with young readers. In a fitting turn of events for a storybook bear based on a real teddy, plush Paddington Bears were soon a popular item on toy store shelves, and toy paddington bears remain popular to this day. In the 1980s, the traditional brown teddy bear got a technicolor update when artist Elena Kacharyk first drew her rainbow-hued Care Bears characters. The Bright Bears originally featured on greeting cards for the American greeting card company, but the company quickly branched out into selling plush versions of Kucarik's creations. By 1985, the Bears starred in a cartoon television series that focused on promoting the values of kindness, love and friendship.

Each bear sported a unique symbol on their fuzzy belly. The bear's superpower was the Care Bear Stare, a glittery ray with the power to heal hurt feelings and neutralise negative thoughts that is activated through the symbols on each bear's belly. And now, it's only fitting to end with the tale of a very special teddy bear. You might not have heard of Magellan T. Bear, but he's certainly the best-travelled teddy in the world, in fact, in the galaxy. Magellan is a plush blue bear who, in 1995, took one giant leap for bearkind when he became the first teddy to officially travel into space. Magellan accompanied astronauts on the space shuttle Discovery as they carried out the 3 mission, to rendezvous with the Russian space station, Mir. These days, Magellan lives in the National Air a brookling candy shop to outer space.

But the humble teddy bear managed that journey in just under a century and charmed the whole world in the process. And yet, one of the teddy bears most important jobs is helping people the world over to get a good night's sleep as they cuddle up with their beloved toys, each and every night. నినినినినినినినినినినినినినినినినినినినినినినినినినినినినినినినినినినినినినినినినినినినినినినినినినినినినినినినినినినినినినినినినినినినినినినినినినినినినినినినినినినినినినినినినినినినినినినినినినినినినినినినినినినినినినినినినినినినినినినినినినినినినినినినినినినినినినినినినినినినినినినినినినినినినినినినినినినినినినినినినినినినినినినినినినినినినినినినినినినినినినినినినినినినినినినినినినినినినినినినినినినినినినినినినినినినినినినినినినినినినినినినినినినినినినినినినినినినినినినినినినినినినినినినినినినినినినినినినినినినినినినినినినినినినినినినినినినినినినినినినినినినినినినినినినినినినినినినినినినినినినినినినినినినినినినినినినినినినినినినినినినినినినినినినినినినినినినినినినినినినినినినినినినినినినినినినినినినినినినినినినినినినినినినినినినినినినినినినినినినినినినినినినినినినినినినినినినినినినినినినినినినినినినినినినినినినినినినినినినినినినినినినినినినినినినినినినినినినినినినినినినినినినినినినినినినినినినినినినినినినినినినినినినినినినినినినినినినినినినినినినినినినినినినినినినినినినినినినినినినినినినినినినినినినినినినినినినినినినినినినినినినినినినినినినినినినినినినినినినినినినినినినినినినినినినినినినినినినినినినినినినినినినినినినినినినినినినినినినినినినినినినినినినినినినినినినినినినినినినినినినినినినినినినినినినినినినినినినినినినినినినినినినినినినినినినినినినినినినినినినినినినినినినినినినినినినినినినినినినినినినినినినినినినినినినినినినినినినినినినినినినినినినినినినినినినినినినినినినినినినినినినినినినినినినినినినినినినిన� you