September 9 is International Teddy Bear Day! This Photo of the Week shows little Zia Shields "with original Teddy Bear (left), introduced 50 years ago by Morris Michtom of Brooklyn, founder of the Ideal Toy Corporation, and the new golden anniversary version of Teddy, a blue-eyed, gold-and-brown plush dressed little fellow with soft, moulded plastic."
Morris Michtom emigrated from Russia in 1889 and by 1934 theTimes Union had dubbed him "Santa's chief dollmaker." After the success of the Teddy Bear, Michtom started manufacturing dolls in 1907. In 1934, the Shirley Temple and Flossie Flirt dolls were the craze of the Christmas season -- 1500 rubber dolls were produced in a day at the Ideal Novelty & Toy Company's Brooklyn plant at 273 Van Sinderen Avenue ("Santa's Chief Boro Aide Heads World's Largest Plant for Dollmaking," December 16, 1934, Times Union). While we may not have heard of these popular dolls today, Teddy Bears have truly stood the test time!
Interested in seeing more photos from CBH’s collections? Visit our online image gallery, which includes a selection of our images, or the digital collections portal at Brooklyn Public Library. We welcome appointments to research our entire collection of images, archives, maps, and special collections. Our reference staff is available to help with your research! You can reach us at cbhreference@bklynlibrary.org.
This blog post reflects the opinions of the author and does not necessarily represent the views of Brooklyn Public Library.
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