Do you remember the movie “The Yellow Rolls-Royce?” You know the movie where a Rolls-Royce Phantom II romps across Europe on several adventures during the twentieth century. Now, consider a toy, or better, a stuffed doll doing something similar. Not a Barbie, a My Little Pony, a Star Wars' Action Figure or a Beanie Baby, but the best toy ever for a twentieth century child. How about a Teddy Bear! You know, like the ones inspired by that great bull moose, Theodore Roosevelt.
What would a stuffed teddy bear see, if it survived through the twentieth century? What adventures would it have. What experiences would the children, who embraced it, have? Let your mind wander through the end of the Gilded Age, the Progressive Era, the Great War, the Roaring Twenties, the Great Depression, World War II, the Red Scare, the Space Race, the Nixon Era, the Reagan Revolution and beyond.
Such a bear would be around changes in music, fashion, literature, inventions, child rearing attitudes, medicine, tastes, habits, automobiles and all sorts of fads. Popular heroes and heroines would come and go. What about the seminal innovation of the twentieth century, the movies. The parade of flicks is astounding, as is the way you are exposed to the movie experience. Little bear, prepare yourself for a wild ride.
