The Ramblings Of A Silly Old Man - CHAPTER FIVE

YOUR FIRST TEDDY BEAR

Can you remember the name of your first teddy bear ?  Mine was Sooty, named after the puppet Sooty a TV programme for kids with Harry Corbett - Sooty and Sweep. Do you remember ?

I still have Sooty, he lives in a cupboard in my home. It is now sixty-seven years ago that Sooty first became a friend. I do not know who first introduced him to me, who gave me Sooty, it may well have been Father Christmas. What I do remember is I had been out with Mum and Dad, Sooty being with us all. When we got home I found that I did not have Sooty any longer. Oh dear. All these years later I can remember so clearly Dad going out in the rain and the dark, retracing our steps in an attempt to rescue Sooty.

Dad did find Sooty, I had dropped him in the entrance drive to a petrol station. There were not that many cars back then but laying on the ground and covered in mud cars had driven over my friend. He must have felt very sad and lonely.  My Mum lovingly restored Sooty to health. She gave him an bath, hung him up to dry by his ears and all was well again.

Sooty soon had a friends to play with, another teddy bear who I called Archie. Archie today lives in retirement with Sooty in the cupboard at home. Arche took his name, or I gave it to him, from the BBC Home Service programme Educating Archie starring ventriloquist Peter Brough. How can you have a ventriloquist show on the radio ? Only The BBC could come up with that mad idea !

The teddy bear is named after U.S. President Theodore “Teddy" Roosevelt. In 1902, President Roosevelt participated in a bear-hunting trip in Mississippi. While hunting, Roosevelt declared the behavior of the other hunters “unsportsmanlike" after he refused to kill a bear they had captured.

A teddy bear is an inanimate object, a child's toy made from fur fabric and stuffing. At least it is when it leaved the factory. The love of its child friend then changes it. Oh yes it does, it becomes real. By ingesting the love the child gives to it the teddy takes on a life of its own. Do you remember the song Puff The Magic Dragon from Peter, Paul and Mary. The magic is the child's love. Allow me to share the words with you.

Puff, the magic dragon lived by the sea

And frolicked in the autumn mist in a land called Honahlee

Little Jackie paper loved that rascal puff

And brought him strings and sealing wax and other fancy stuff oh..

Puff, the magic dragon lived by the sea

And frolicked in the autumn mist in a land called Honahlee

Puff, the magic dragon lived by the sea

And frolicked in the autumn mist in a land called Honahlee

Together they would travel on a boat with billowed sail

Jackie kept a lookout perched on Puff's gigantic tail

Noble kings and princes would bow where'ere they sailed

Pirate ships would lower their flags when Puff roared out his name

Puff, the magic dragon lived by the sea

And frolicked in the autumn mist in a land called Honahlee

Puff, the magic dragon lived by the sea

And frolicked in the autumn mist in a land called Honahlee

A dragon lives for ever but not so little boys

Painted wings and giant rings make way for other toys

One grey night it happened Jackie Paper came no more

And Puff that mighty dragon ceased his fearless roar

His head was bent in sorrow, green scales fell like rain

Puff no longer went to play along the cherry lane

Without his life-long fiend Puff could not be brave

So Puff that mighty dragon sadly slipped into his cave

Puff, the magic dragon lived by the sea

And frolicked in the autumn mist in a land called Honahlee

Puff, the magic dragon lived by the sea

And frolicked in the autumn mist in a land called Honahlee

Don't tell me you are too cold hearted for that not to have brought a tear to your eye.  Sooty, Archie I think I had better go and find you in that cupboard. I have another teddy bear you can make friends.  Ben is my teddy and mascot for the music I play. Ben is a radio star, he has his own video on YouTube and has danced The Lambeth Walk on London's Lambeth Walk.

But Ben was once homeless, unloved and unwanted. A friend found him on a pile of rubbish waiting for the bin men to take him away and bury him deep in landfill. Oh Ben, how sad. So Ben is now my mascot with the love of all the music I play, he now has his own chapter in this silly little book I am writing. For me Ben represents all the people society has discarded and wants to disappear, the homeless rough-sleepers, the lonely, the forgotten, those with depression. To you all I tell you that Ben loves you.