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Dolls N DreamsHi all, I'm not that knowledgeable about old teddy bears so needed some help from those of you that are..........my husband was given this teddy bear last week from his father, it belonged to my husbands grandmother when she was a little girl..........which would have been early 1900's, the bear is close to 9" tall, has disc type joints, I can feel those, stuffed with excelsior and some padding.......no label or tags, I don't even know if the bear was purchased from a manufacture or someone could have even made it for her? Have any ideas at all....thanks in advance.
PennsylvaniaDon't forget, the "Teddy Bear" as we know it wasn't invented until 1902-1903.
It wasn't until the newspaper cartoon by Clifford Berryman appeared in the Washington Star, "Drawing the Line in Mississippi" when the link between Teddy Roosevelt was made. That was in 1902.
Morris Mictom didn't form the Ideal Toy Company which made the first "Teddy's Bear" by permission of the president until 1903.
Margarete Steiff didn't start making Bears until 1902 and they didn't start to become popular in the US until 1904.
Previous to this, the only plush toy bears were of the four-legged variety, usually muzzled and collared like a circus animal. The two-legged Bear we all know today probably didn't become really, really popular unti 1905-1910.
Next, take a look at the seam in his foot where it's gone bare. It looks like a machine stitch. Is it?
That will also help date the Bear. Hand stitched, machine stitched or whatnot can help you put a finger on how and when it was made.
Hand stitched nose, button eyes and no claws. That can also help date him.
That's really all I've got to go on. My Teddy Bear encyclopedias aren't helping.
Jac-Q-LynHi
I have just found this similar bear on a ladies blog, this one is approx 10 inches and American made, which was purchased in 1917 (when the original owner was born)
here is a link to the blog.
http://tracystoys.blogspot.com/2010_04_01_archive.html
I know this is not much help but it might be a starting point that it is a bear made in the US and perhaps not Europe.
Good Luck and if I see anything else I will pop it along to you.
Hugs
Jacqui
p.s. he is a very nice bear by the way and still has plenty of fur 
My guess is that he's a manufactured American bear of an inexpensive type (small, with no paw or foot pads).
Us Bears is probably right - 1910 or later.
He's a charmer!
Becky
BeauT BearsHi Tami,
I'm not sure this is a US bear but then, I am no expert on US bears. But to be honest, I don't see much similarity between your bear and the one in the link Jacqui sent. That one has very obvious characteristics of a US bear.
A couple of years ago I wrote a small article for an English magazine about a Steiff bear a friend of us inherited from his aunt. And his hand and feet were exactly like those of your bear. Undermentioned link shows the article 'The tug boat captain, his aunt and her bear' including pics of the bear. It's up to you if you see the similarity too.
http://www.beautbears.nl/Hoofdpagina-En … opbouw.htm in this link click 'Media'
Unfortunately the text in this PDF cannot be read but it contains rather detailed info on the bear. I can get you the text next weekend when I am back home. I think the bear was produced between 1912 and 1915 but I'm not sure about that. Just let me know if you are interested.
Hugs from Holland,
Marianne
PennsylvaniaHe is a good looking Bear for his age. :)
I'm going to bet he was made around 1915 or 1920. That's when the Teddy Bear craze really started to take off in the US. Teddy Bears were all the rage. Everybody was making them. People were even making them at home.
The following is all gleaned from our Teddy Bear encyclopedias:
His eyes are black buttons. That dates him before approx. 1930 because, by that time, they started making Bears with amber glass eyes. There still were Bears with button eyes but they weren't as popular.
His nose stitching goes sideways.
His feet and hands do not have paws or claws. Instead, they are simply sewn together.
That rules out all the Steiff, Schuco, Merrythought and similar.
There were a few companies like Chad Valley and Chiltern who made Bears similar but none of them look like your Bear.
I'm going to bet that your Bear was made either by a small company which sprang up during the Teddy Bear craze which went out of business (or retooled) after the bubble burst or else the Bear was made at home by a craftsperson.
Jac-Q-LynHi Again
I have checked in one of the Steiff Sortiment Books 1892-1943 and there is a bear similar, and similar size which had a double squeaker Dopperldruckstimme 25cm Brummstimme. The only thing is the dates are not so good 1934-1943. If you do not have access to the above book here is a link to a page with information and a picture of the said bear page 22 bear 45, this auction house has a different year of manufacture but the one I saw was in the Steiff Sortiment book so I would imagine that was more accurate.
http://www.steiff.de/fileadmin/download … r_2007.pdf
I do hope you get to identify the manufacturer of this darling bear. Good luck and best wishes.
Jacqui :hug:
PennsylvaniaWhich direction is "Bear 45's" nose sewn? Horizontally or vertically? Our Bear's nose was sewn horizontally.
What kind of eyes does "Bear 45" have? Ours has black buttons. It looks like "Bear 45" has glass eyes.
If our Bear is a Steiff, you might find a place in his ear where the button used to be.
Jac-Q-LynI was a bit unsure on the eyes, I thought they were glass too. I have just been looking again at the book and seen 17 PAB which was manufactured 1905 similar again but I have tried to find a picture on the net but nothing showing only the larger sized bear which has foot pads. If it was one of these bears that would be wonderful, but not confident on that score. Regarding the stitching of the nose, cannot see clearly enough, but on the early Replica bears I have sold in my shop they were stitched horizontally. The thing that looks a bit out of character to me is the size of ears, granted the head is distorted in shape but the ears do look a bit big so that was why I thought it more like the original bear I mentioned manufactured in the USA.
I hope someone comes on that can help solve the identity of the bear, its so interesting :-)
:hug: :hug:
PennsylvaniaDiscovering a Bear's pedigree often comes in baby steps.
You look at small details such as the eyes, the nose, the mouth and work from there.
Arctophilia is not often an exact science. 
This is a very interesting mystery!
I was surprised to see Marianne's photo of a Steiff bear with such short arms. That was partly why I'd placed your bear as American. But the Steiff bear has a head and face that look like Steiff to me. Now - don't tell this bear I said so, but his head looks too small for his body, his eyes look over-sized, and his ears are stuck on the top of his head, though it looks like at least one has been re-attached. (His nose might well have been re-stitched as well.) To me, the face also lacks shape and definition.
What about submitting your photos, perhaps with a profile shot, to Teddy Bear Times? There's a feature there with help in identifying old bears.
Becky
Dolls N DreamsThanks everyone for all the suggestions...........still a mystery.
BeauT Bears
Hi, it's been some time since this topic was last replied to, but it was still on my mind and I already had planned to see if I could find pictures and text of the article I referred to earlier. I found them, and having seen my pictures better one can see the differences even better.
The Steiff bear I wrote about measures about 15cm (seated) and has brown glass pupil eyes, so 2 major differences. Like your bear he has no paw pads but he does have embroidered claws. His nose is horizontally stitched.
I thought maybe you would like to see the pictures for better comparison and if you would like to read the story that goes with it (written in 2004), here it is:
Some time ago we went to visit one of our “neighbours" (a tugboat captain), Willem and his wife Rina. Whilst we were there, Rina urged her husband to show me “aunty’s teddy bear" and when I had been handed over the little chap and expressed my admiration, she decided I should take him home. Having seen this teddy for no longer than a few minutes I had already seen that this was something special. It could not be anything else than an early Steiff, but how early I did not know at that time. Of course I could not accept this generous gift, because my first impression was that this bear might be quite valuable. So I decided to try and find out more about this little bear. First I asked Willem and Rina if they knew anything about this bear’s history, its origine, and they most certainly did.
To give you a proper image of things, you should know that Willem and Rina are both over 60 (at the time I wrote this because Rina died last October). As a child Willem regularly visited his aunts. One of them used to have a little (about 8 or 9 inch) doll in a sailor suit and sailor hat, which Willem (being the son of a tugboat captain) was always highly attracted to. Occasionally he was allowed to play with the doll. When Willem grew older the little sailor doll grew older too, but it still had its own place on the sideboard in his aunt's living room.
One or two years ago Willem’s favourite aunt died. He inherited the small sailor doll which reminded him so much of his childhood and the happy hours he had spent playing with the doll. But … he was not allowed to take the doll home unless he gave this little teddy bear a good home too, the little teddy bear that had been given to aunty when she was a child. And when Willem told me that his aunt was born in the year 1904, I realized this bear was not just old but that it had to be very old.
Now I had something to start searching. I picked up the most recent Steiff price-guide and soon I found what I had been looking for.
Aunty’s bear was called “Teddybär" (well, isn’t that original? But then, at that time it was original or course!). According to the description little "Teddybär" and his other brothers and sisters from the No.12 series had been manufactured between 1906 and 1933. The article code of this bear was no. 5315. He has glass pupil eyes, that are painted brown on the back side, and he has a so-called “Druckstimme" (squeeking voice - it still moves but unfortunately lost its voice).
This bear has a little hole in his left ear but must have lost his button long ago since he was visibly played with. He measures 22 cm (15 cm seated) and was the smallest in his family. There were two bears like him in the No. 12 series. They were larger sized, if I remember well 28 and 35 cm. These larger brothers were made of the same yellow mohair, but they had paw pads made of woolfelt. The benjamin of this trio has no woolfelt paw pads, actually it has no paw pads at all. Each arm and leg consists of an inner and an outer pattern part.
At the same time there was another series of these three bears, made of a lighter, blonde mohair. An important difference was that in these series all three sizes had woolfelt paw pads, and I have not discovered any other Steiff teddies without paw pads from this era in the guides, which makes "aunty’s bear" rather unique I think.
Considering aunty was born in the year 1904 and this bear was given to her when she was a child, and that the bear was produced as from 1906, this ted must have been bought somewhere between 1906 and 1910.
I therefore think this might be one of the older Steiff bears “alive" , and it has its own story. Isn’t that just wonderful?
Did you by the way get any closer to what 'family' your bear belongs to? Please let us know if so
Hi Tami,
It looks like what they used to call a "Carnival Bear" - American Made, given out as prizes in the early 1900's at carnivals!
Hugs,
Janice
Your poor guy looks a little flattened but looks somewhat like this bear:
http://www.bourtonbears.com/item.php?re … 1.php%2311
Karen
Posts: 2,203What an awesome bear!
Creative Design Studio (RKR4CDS)The fur/fabric is still *wrong/different* in all of these comparisons.
The sample ted has a very long nap in comparison to his size.
And in very great condition, with very little wear on it!
That curious front Body seam is significant to me - has it been re-sewn for some reason? (e.g., was a growler removed perhaps?)
Especially in light of the obvious machine stitching everywhere else.
Curiouser & curiouser .....
(and I HATE the fact that his maker has left his fur trapped in the seams for all of these years.
I feel like my 'angry' Mom just French-braided my hair too tightly for the day!!!)
Dolls N DreamsYour poor guy looks a little flattened but looks somewhat like this bear:
http://www.bourtonbears.com/item.php?re … 1.php%2311
Karen
Hi Karen, yes he does....
Dolls N DreamsThe fur/fabric is still *wrong/different* in all of these comparisons.
The sample ted has a very long nap in comparison to his size.
And in very great condition, with very little wear on it!That curious front Body seam is significant to me - has it been re-sewn for some reason? (e.g., was a growler removed perhaps?)
Especially in light of the obvious machine stitching everywhere else.
Curiouser & curiouser .....(and I HATE the fact that his maker has left his fur trapped in the seams for all of these years.
I feel like my 'angry' Mom just French-braided my hair too tightly for the day!!!)
I know what you mean, it does look like someone did a little surgery on his tummy......LOL
Pennsylvania...and I HATE the fact that his maker has left his fur trapped in the seams for all of these years.
I feel like my 'angry' Mom just French-braided my hair too tightly for the day!!!
That one thing, right there, virtually precludes any chance of the Bear being a Steiff.
IIRC, Steiff are sewn on machines with air blowers and little plow-shaped gizmos that push the fur out of the seams as they are being sewed. Further, if fur did get trapped in the seams, the Bearmaker would have taken a needle and plucked the fur out of the seam.
German craftspeople are just too fastidious to let something like that slip by. 
