The unri­valled pop­u­lar­i­ty of the ted­dy bear as a toy has roots in Amer­i­can his­to­ry. While stuffed bears were also man­u­fac­tured in Europe, Brook­lyn toy store own­ers Rose and Mor­ris Mich­tom were the first to call the lov­able plush ani­mals by Pres­i­dent Theodore ​“Ted­dy” Roosevelt’s nick­name. Roo­sevelt was a com­mit­ted con­ser­va­tion­ist, but also an avid hunter. When he decid­ed to spare the life of a young bear on one of his out­ings, the press pub­li­cized the sto­ry and the pub­lic respond­ed to this appar­ent­ly humane ges­ture. When Mor­ris Mich­tom learned about the great man who mag­nan­i­mous­ly refused to kill a help­less ani­mal, he decid­ed to dis­play his wife’s new cre­ation, a bear named Ted­dy, in his store. Nan­cy Churnin and Bethany Stancliffe’s new pic­ture book cel­e­brates the Jew­ish iden­ti­ty of the Mich­toms, immi­grants whose loy­al­ty to their new coun­try, along with inge­nu­ity and chutz­pah, led to the cre­ation of an icon.

Jews were promi­nent in the devel­op­ing toy indus­try of ear­ly twen­ti­eth cen­tu­ry Amer­i­ca. Mor­ris and Rose would even­tu­al­ly found the Ide­al Toy Com­pa­ny, pro­duc­ing sev­er­al of the best-sell­ing play­things found in most house­holds. When the book begins, how­ev­er, they are Mama and Papa, hav­ing break­fast with their daugh­ter Emi­ly before Papa leaves for his mod­est busi­ness. While Papa is busy sell­ing can­dy and toys to their neigh­bors, Mama begins a new sewing project. Churnin cap­tures the warmth of the rela­tion­ship between Emi­ly and her moth­er, includ­ing the Yid­dish endear­ments that Rose uses to address the lit­tle girl who is eager to help. Stuffed ani­mals do not appear out of nowhere; Churnin con­jures the reward­ing process of turn­ing fab­ric, thread, and stuff­ing into a child’s com­pan­ion: “‘Bear!’ Mama held two pieces of cloth togeth­er. She turned the sides inside out so the vel­vet sides kissed.”

As moth­er and daugh­ter sew the ted­dy bear, Rose tells Emi­ly how Papa arrived in the Unit­ed States as a young boy, and lat­er met a young Jew­ish woman who was hap­py to share his liveli­hood. In Rose’s descrip­tion, her hus­band always cared about oth­ers. Hav­ing found refuge from anti­se­mit­ic per­se­cu­tion, he felt oblig­at­ed to rec­i­p­ro­cate by design­ing and sell­ing goods that would make chil­dren happy. 

Stancliffe’s pic­tures are bright­ly col­ored, cheer­ful ren­di­tions of fam­i­ly and com­mu­ni­ty life. The Mich­toms’ store is stocked with baked goods and can­dies in every hue, from cobalt blue to gold. Char­ac­ters’ sim­ple but expres­sive ges­tures con­vey their feel­ings, as when Papa pon­ders what to name the new bear, or Rose cra­dles her baby son and looks down at the let­ter from Pres­i­dent Roo­sevelt. He has glad­ly giv­en them per­mis­sion to mar­ket Rose’s lat­est prod­uct, andthe rest is his­to­ry. The Mich­toms’ inspired response to Roosevelt’s benev­o­lent act makes an appeal­ing tale, but Churnin and Stan­cliffe have enriched it by draw­ing a fuller pic­ture. In this high­ly rec­om­mend­ed pic­ture book, the spe­cif­ic con­tri­bu­tion of two Jew­ish immi­grants to Amer­i­ca becomes one exam­ple of infi­nite pos­si­bil­i­ties when new­com­ers encounter accep­tance and free­dom. The book includes an infor­ma­tive author’s note.