davidd’s A DOLL A DAY 2022

[davidd]

Now I'm even more curious as to the nature of the project.

The nature of this project is increasingly coming to look like all my other projects: grand ambitions that result in half-finished junk piled in the back of the storage shed.

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25 July - A Doll A Day 2022:

25 July - Mister Bear in a Rocking Chair

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Today is my grandma's birthday. Or, it would be her birthday, if, well, you know. Anyway, this little rocking chair belonged to my grandma. She used to enjoy telling the story about her parents purchasing this chair for her when she was only three months old.

I'm not sure when Mister Bear's exact birthday is, but since he is a Dan Dee "100th Anniversary Teddy Bear" he was manufactured born in 2002, so that makes him twenty years old this year! Mister Bear was a "dump rescue" a few years ago. I found him sleeping in a dumpster at the local refuse disposal center. I brought him home, cleaned him up, and he spent a couple of years standing guard duty in the storage shed before being promoted to the position of greeter in a vacation rental cabin. Now Mister Bear spends his days in a rocking chair swapping stories with guests from around the country and around the world.

A sad little fact I read today about the popularity of Teddy Bears is that the first two significant Teddy Bear Museums that opened in the mid-1980s when Teddy Bears became something of a fad -- one in the U.S. and one in England -- closed around 2005-2006 and their collections were auctioned off. That would have been shortly after the 100th anniversary (2002-2003) of the creation of the Teddy Bear.

Another sad little fact that I noticed several weeks ago is that a recent television biography of former U.S. President Theodore Roosevelt, after whom the iconic Teddy Bear was named, did not mention the Teddy Bear, nor use it as an example to illustrate Roosevelt's popularity. The narration told the viewer that Roosevelt was popular, but, c'mon, man, it's television! The "Show Don't Tell" rule applies! It would have taken only a line or two to mention the plush toy inspired by a Roosevelt hunting incident.

One additional fact I learned today; or rather, a new vocabulary word: deaccessioning. Apparently that is what rich people do with their unwanted old stuff. They don't "sell" it. They "deaccession" it. I learned that fun fact in an article about the current state of the vintage Teddy Bear market:

https://auctiondaily.com/news/4-trends-i...-lockdown/