The realWinnie-the-Pooh FAQ
With release of ‘Robin’movie, here’s all about author A.A. Milne.
With the release of the movie “Goodbye Christopher Robin,” we give a little background on A.A. Milne, creator of the “Winnie-thePooh” books and poems; his son Christopher; and the bothersomebearthatbrought them fame.
■ A.A. Milne had 18 plays and three novels published before hisWinnie-the-Pooh poemsand stories catapulted him to fame. “TheRedHouse Mystery,” alocked-roomwhodunnit published in 1922, did bring the author some prePoohmeasure of popularity.
■ The writer was a captain of the British Home Guard who became a pacificist and wrote “PeaceWith Honour” in 1934. It became quite a bother to Milnewhen a honey-loving bear named Pooh and his pals became Milne’s calling card to fame.
■ “When We Were Very Young,” published in 1924, was the firstWinnie-the-Pooh book and was dedicated to the author’s son, 4-year-old ChristopherRobin Milne. Last of the fourwas “TheHouse at Pooh Corner,” published in 1928, and by that time each book was selling in the hundred-thousandsworldwide.
■ The original Pooh bear was purchased at Harrods department store in London and given by A. A. Milne to his son Christopher Robin on his first birthday, Aug. 21, 1921, according to the New York Public Library. He called the bear Edward (proper form of Teddy) Bear at the time.
■ ThestuffedbearEdward was renamed for a real-life black bear calledWinnie that had been a mascot for the Winnipeg regiment of the Canadian Army and lived out its days at the London Zoo. Pooh was the name of a swan in “When We Were Very Young.” The realWinnie’s skull, kept at the Royal College of Surgeons, revealed that thebearhadtooth decay — toomuch honey!— according toa2015story intheLondon Daily Mail.
■ Walt Disney Productions licensed certain rights to the characters from Stephen Slesinger Inc. and A.A. Milne’s estate and made a series of popular animated films and TV series about their adventures. Slesinger, who adapted the image of Winnie-the-PoohfromErnest H. Shepard’s original drawings, later sued Disney over royalties.
■ Jim Cummings, who replaced the late SterlingHolloway and Paul Winchell as Winnie-the-Pooh and Tigger, respectively, in the Disney films, gets a film credit in “Christopher Robin.” His dozens of voiceover characters include the hyena Ed in “The Lion King.”
■ The New York Public Library has housed, maintained and displayed Christopher Robin’s original toys since 1987. The library’swebsite said they arrived from England in the 1950s, when former Dutton Publishing president Elliott Macrae visitedA.A. Milne’sSussexhouse and arranged a tour of the United States. Winnie-thePooh, Tigger, Eeyore, Piglet and Kangawere then put on display at E.P. Dutton & Co. Publishers in New York City in 1956.
■ A.A. Milne suffered a stroke and died at age 74 in 1956. Christopher Robin Milne suffered with myasthenia gravis formany years and died in 1996, at age 75.