John Blankenbaker's Germanna History Notes

Note 1550

Who is celebrating birthday number One Hundred?  He is actually well known.  It is Mr. Theodore Bear, usually called by his nickname, Teddy.  His mother was Appolonia Margarete Steiff, a most remarkable woman, who was born in 1847, in Germany.  When she was 18 months old, she contracted polio, which left her without the use of her legs, and only partial control of her right arm.  In her family, the female members earned a living as seamstresses.  Margarete's partial paralysis did not deter her from learning the trade of a seamstress; it only took her a little longer.  Margarete and her older sisters were so successful that their father enlarged the family home to add a workshop.  Eventually the sisters left home, but Margarete continued and added a felt shop when she was 30.  This required the opening of a small factory.

Always on the lookout for ideas, Margarete produced some elephant pincushions to give away to friends as Christmas presents.  The elephants, though, made the biggest hit with the children, not with the mothers.  The factory expanded into "Felt Things and Toy Factory".  Each year there were new additions until, by 1893, the company was listed in the commercial register and appeared at the trade shows showing their wares.  Soon there were thirty different animals, such as monkeys, donkeys, horses, dromedaries, pigs, cats, dogs, mice, rabbits, and giraffes (but no bears).  Some of the animals were mounted on wheels and this version was a popular line.

As the enterprise grew, Margarete enlisted the aid of family members, in particular, her nephew, Richard, who was close to his aunt.  He was an artist who enjoyed watching the bears in the zoo.  He made sketches of them.  He proposed an idea to Margarete.  Let's do a bear but let's add some new features.  The head should be able to turn and the arms and legs should be moveable.  The covering was to be mohair and it was to have glass eyes.

Margarete was not impressed.  She thought a bear would frighten children, it would be costly to produce, and it was too risky.  Richard persisted and got Margarete's approval for Petsy ¹ (an old-fashioned name for bears used in fairy tales).  Officially the bear was 55 PB ² .  The 55 was the bear's height in centimeters (about 22 inches), P stood for plush, and B for moveable.  Richard took a consignment of 55 PB to the Leipzig Toy Trade Fair in 1902 to test the market.  The result was what his aunt had predicted.  No one was interested.  It appears that one 55 PB went to America.

Unconnected with the appearance of 55 PB, Teddy Roosevelt was involved in an episode with a bear cub which drew favorable publicity.  This is believed to be the origin of the name Teddy bear ³ .  The idea of a Teddy bear caught on on both sides of the Atlantic with both the public and manufacturers.  Richard brought out an improved model, the 35 PB of 1905, and even his aunt loved this.  To show the product was genuine, in 1904 it became the practice for the Steiff factory to sew a button in the ear.  In 1908, the Steiff factory officially adopted the name " Teddy Bear ".  By 1907, three thousand Teddy bears were leaving the factory every day, or almost a million in the year.  At one time, 1800 people worked in Margarete Steiff's factories.  She died in 1909, after having issued more than five hundred different models of soft toy animals.  Apparently she did not know what the words, "mobility challenged", meant. (From an article by Sue Grant in "Austrian, Swiss & German Life.")
(19 Dec 02)

(NOTE:  An explanation of "Petsy" by Andreas Mielke, a German historian and a frequent contributor to the GERMANNA_COLONIES Mailing List (see below) at Rootsweb:

• ¹ Trying to understand the German behind this, I recall that the fairy tale bear's name was "Meister Petz".  ("Meister", incidentally means "master" and is not derogatory but is, rather, more complimentary than, say, "Manager".)
• ² For those interested in language, the German word for plush is "Pluesch", ["Plüsch", with Umlaut], and for moveable, "Beweglich".  ~~hence PB..  In German, these genuine plush critters are usually called "Steiff-Knopf-im-Ohr" (Steiff-Button-in-Ear), to differentiate them from cheaper versions of plush animals.)

(NOTE:  There is controversy over "how" the Teddy Bear received its name.  Suzee Oberg, another frequent contributor to the GERMANNA_COLONIES Mailing List, sent the following:

• ³ Loved this note, John. There is a little more to it than they stated.  The Brittish claim that the Teddy bear was made in honor of King Edward Vll, whose nickname was Teddy.  The Germans claim it was because of the Steiff toy.  Americans know it was because our own Teddy Roosevelt refused to shoot a helpless bear cub and the incident was immortalized by a cartoonist of the time.  All most people really care about is getting a special one for their child or grandchild, or adding to their collection as an adult.  Happy Birthday to his fluffiness and may he celebrate many more.  Click here for a web site about the history of Teddy Bear, and the three claims.