November 6, 1924: A.A. Milne Introduces Winnie-the-Pooh

November 6, 1924: A.A. Milne publishes When We Were Very Young, a book of poetry. It sells well, and introduces one of the best-loved characters in children's literature: Winnie-the-Pooh.

Alan Alexander Milne was born on January 18, 1882 in Kilburn, North-West London. He graduated from Cambridge University, and both wrote for and edited the literary magazine Punch, before serving in World War I. He had a talent for cricket, and played on an all-authors team that included Sherlock Holmes' creator Arthur Conon Doyle, Peter Pan's creator James M. Barrie, and Jeeves & Wooster's creator P.G. Wodehouse.

In 1920, he and his wife, Dorothy "Daphne" de Sélincourt, became the parents of a boy, whom they named Christopher Robin Milne. The following year, at the famed Harrod's department store, he bought a stuffed teddy bear for his son. 

When We Were Very Young consists of 44 poems. The 38th was titled "Teddy Bear." Men named Edward were nicknamed "Ted" or "Teddy" long before Senator Edward M. Kennedy: Even Britain's King Edward VII, reigning from 1901 to 1910, had among his nicknames "Good Old Teddy."

In the poem, the narrator is said to be Christopher Robin, who had named his teddy bear "Edward," and later changed it to "Winnie," believe dot have been inspired by a black bear they'd seen at the London Zoo, itself possibly named for Winston Churchill, then a young but already prominent British political figure.

In a story commissioned by London's Evening News for Christmas 1925, the character was brought back, and the name "Winnie-the-Pooh" appeared for the first time. Milne wrote:

But his arms were so stiff... they stayed up straight in the air for more than a week, and whenever a fly came and settled on his nose he had to blow it off. And I think – but I am not sure – that that is why he is always called Pooh.

Milne owned a farm in Ashdown Forest, East Sussex, England, which, in the stories, became Hundred Acre Wood. Other stuffed toys of Christopher Robin became characters in the story: Piglet the pig, Eeyore the donkey, Tigger the tiger, Wol the owl, Rabbit the hare, and Kanga the kangaroo and her son Roo. E.H. Shepard illustrated the stories, and Pooh was usually drawn wearing just a shirt, which became red in the later cartoons from the Walt Disney Studios, with Sterling Holloway voicing him.

Milne died in 1956, Shepard in 1976. Christopher was wounded in World War II, and ran a bookstore, but did not enjoy it. He was married, but had only one child, Clare, a daughter with cerebral palsy. He did not enjoy his indirect famed, and died in 1996. Clare became an advocate for others with CP, and died in 2012, and so A.A. Milne's genetic line died out. No happy ending here.

*

November 6, 1924 was a Thursday. Baseball was out of season. Football was in midweek. Professional basketball barely existed. And the NHL season didn't start until November 29. So there were no scores on this historic day.