The Real Winnie-the-Pooh Was a $20 WWI Bear Cub

A soldier steps off a train at a tiny station in northern Ontario and walks away with a bear cub tucked under his arm. That is not the plot of a children's book. It is the actual origin story of Winnie-the-Pooh.

A Vet Heading to War

Lt. Harry Colebourn was a veterinarian from Winnipeg, Manitoba, serving with the Fort Garry Horse, a Canadian cavalry regiment. In August 1914, he was on a train heading east to Quebec, the first stop on his journey to fight in the First World War.

"Bought Bear $20"

On August 24, 1914, the train stopped at White River, Ontario.

A local trapper was there with an orphaned black bear cub - he had shot her mother but could not bring himself to kill the cub too, so he sold her instead.

Colebourn bought her on the spot for $20.

His personal diary from that day records the moment bluntly: "Bought bear $20."

He named her Winnipeg, after his hometown. The soldiers just called her Winnie.

The Regiment's Mascot

Winnie followed Colebourn to Salisbury Plain in England, where the Canadian troops trained before shipping to the front.

She became the unofficial mascot of the Fort Garry Horse and the Second Canadian Infantry Brigade, posing for photos with soldiers and sleeping under Colebourn's cot at night.

Left Behind at London Zoo

When Colebourn's brigade was finally ordered to France in December 1914, he could not bring a bear into the trenches.

On December 9, 1914, he left Winnie at London Zoo for safekeeping, planning to collect her after the war.

Once he saw how much visitors adored her, he decided to leave her there permanently.

The Boy Who Fed Her Condensed Milk

Winnie turned out to be so gentle that zookeepers let children into her enclosure to pet and feed her.

One of them was a young boy named Christopher Robin Milne, who became a regular visitor starting in 1924.

Winnie disliked honey. Instead, Christopher Robin fed her spoonfuls of condensed milk.

He loved her so much that he renamed his own teddy bear, previously called Edward Bear, after her.

His father, author A.A. Milne, took notice, and in 1926 published a book about a boy and his bear called Winnie-the-Pooh.

A Century of Silly Old Bears

Winnie lived at London Zoo until she died in 1934. The books A.A. Milne wrote about her namesake have never gone out of print.

Nearly a hundred years later, millions of children still fall asleep with a stuffed version of a real Canadian army mascot who once slept under a soldier's cot on her way to war.