'Jocko' teddy bear

For more than a century, many American children have loved and cuddled stuffed toy teddy bears. But do you know why they’re called “teddy bears”? The name is derived from a 1902 story about President Theodore “Teddy” Roosevelt who refused to shoot a wounded bear while hunting in Mississippi because it would be “unsportsmanlike.” News spread of the president’s “compassion,” and entrepreneurs Morris and Rose Michtom seized the opportunity, sewing and selling plush teddy bears in their New York penny store.

 

The trend spread quickly. This furry brown bear all bundled up in an orange sweater was made in Germany and purchased from the Charles Mayer department store in downtown Indianapolis around 1910. The bear was given to donor Jane Bugbee as a child in 1910; her mother gave him the name “Jocko,” the name of the hunting dog that cornered the bear on Roosevelt’s famed hunting trip.