UNITED KINGDOM: Original 'Fozzie Bear' among the collection from the world's oldest teddy bear museum, about to go for auction

The world's oldest teddy bear museum, including an original "Fozzie Bear" from the Muppets, is to be sold off. Owner Gyles Brandreth says he's sad to let it go but "it's time to find new owners for the museum and its unique collection". Time restraints don't allow it to be given the care it deserves. The museum in in Stratford-upon-Avon in England was founded by self-confessed bear enthusiast Brandreth and his wife Michele in 1988. Stratford-upon-Avon attracts five million visitors every year and visitors to the teddy bear museum have ranged from royalty to Tony Blair's teddy, Lynton, who recently spent his summer holidays at the museum. The collection, personally put together by Brandreth, numbers a thousand bears and related items such as clothing, furniture for the bears or books about bears. Highlights from the collection include several early Steiff bears, TV and movie stars such as Fozzie bear or Paddington bear, and other old and rare teddy bears.. The cuddly children's toy - quite unlike a real bear- was invented almost simultaneously in the United States and Germany but the United States undoubtedly gave it its name. In 1902 Theodore 'Teddy' Roosevelt, failing to kill a bear on a hunting trip, was source for a creation of a soft bear toy, which the makers named 'Teddy's Bear' and displayed in their window with a copy of the cartoon about the incidence. America went bear mad almost overnight President Roosevelt had found a highly effective political mascot. On the other side of the Atlantic Margarete Steiff, a disabled German seamstress, had added a soft plush bear to the Steiff catalogue and sold 3,000 to America in 1903. Between 1903 and the First World War Steiff sold literally millions of bears, with their trademark button in the left ear, to the United States, Germany and Britain. For collectors very early Steiff bears, with their hump backs, long snouts, large tapered feet and elongated arms with curved paws, are the most sought-after. Many traditional manufacturers ceased trading in the face of an influx of cheap, mass-produced soft toys from the Far East. By the end of the 1960s the traditional teddy bear appeared doomed. In 1985 Christie's held the first ever auction devoted to old teddy bears and the Teddy Bear Artists Guild was founded in the USA. There's something special about bears, Brandreth says. "Well, the teddy bear has become the world's most popular toy. He is only just over a hundred years old. We've got one of the oldest teddy bears in the world in our collection, dated from 1903. But he was the first toy that boys and girls could play with. And not only boys and girls but children of every age. You keep your teddy bear all your life," Brandreth said. If a buyer for the museum cannot be found by the end of the year, the museum's contents will be individually auctioneered off the Christie's. "I don't want to do that," says Brandreth. "These bears belong together, I want them go on living together."

ITN Source | August 31, 2006

Tags:. .hunting. .britain. .attracts. .gave. .displayed