The 1903 teddy bear is the first one that archives can actually count. That spring, Steiff showed its jointed Bear 55 PB at the Leipzig Toy Fair and won an order for 3,000. In Brooklyn, the Michtoms’ bear business took shape the same year.
This page is a dated record, not a story. It lists what happened from November 1902 to the end of 1909, with the source for each date. For the narrative version, read our history of the teddy bear from the 1902 hunt.
Was the First Teddy Bear Made in 1902 or 1903?
The first teddy bear was designed in 1902 and sold in quantity in 1903. Steiff dates Richard Steiff’s Bear 55 PB to 1902, and the BBC dates its trade debut to spring 1903. The Michtoms’ first bears belong to late 1902 by family tradition, but the oldest surviving Ideal bear is dated about 1903.
So both years are defensible, for different milestones. Our comparison of the Steiff and Michtom claims covers who deserves the credit.
The 1902 Prelude
The 1903 market grew out of a few weeks in late 1902. Four dated events set it up:
- 1902 Richard Steiff designs the Bear 55 PB, by Steiff’s account, using mohair plush from the Schulte mill in Duisburg.
- 1902 November 14: Roosevelt refuses to shoot a tied black bear near Onward, Mississippi, per the National Park Service.
- 1902 November 16: The Washington Post runs Clifford Berryman’s cartoon of the refusal.
- 1902 December 29: Roosevelt writes Berryman that the family is “delighted with the little bear cartoons,” as quoted by the Theodore Roosevelt Presidential Library.
1903, the Year the Teddy Bear Became a Product
Two businesses turned a news story into stock that year. One sold to a single giant buyer, and the other sold over a shop counter.
Spring: Leipzig and the 3,000-bear order
The BBC places the Leipzig Toy Fair debut of the 55 PB in spring 1903. Interest was thin until Hermann Berg, a buyer for George Borgfeldt & Company of New York, ordered 3,000 bears.
That order strained the workshop, and the BBC reports that Steiff had to build a new factory. Steiff’s own timeline records a new east building in 1903. Its double glass and steel walls earned it the nickname “virgin aquarium.”
Brooklyn: Ideal’s first year
The National Park Service and the Smithsonian both date the founding of the Ideal Toy Company to 1903. The Theodore Roosevelt Presidential Library gives 1907 instead, for the Ideal Novelty and Toy Company.
The Smithsonian’s Ideal bear, catalogued as made about 1903, is the clearest physical anchor for the Brooklyn side. Its full object record appears in our main history article.
The 3,000 bears that vanished
The 1903 order is documented, but the bears are not. According to the BBC, Steiff’s archive holds the orders and samples of the boxes. No 55 PB has ever surfaced.
A shipwreck legend fills the gap. Günther Pfeiffer, author of four books on Steiff bears, doubts it. He told the BBC the story first appeared in 1953, in a booklet for the teddy bear’s 50th anniversary.
“If a PB 55 is discovered, he would completely crash and break all existing world records without question.”
Leyla Maniera, former Christie’s teddy bear specialist, speaking to the BBC in 2011
Manuela Fustig of the Steiff Museum in Giengen offered a plainer explanation. The 55 PB’s arms, legs, and head were jointed with string. In her view, most of the bears simply broke and did not survive.
1904 to 1909: From Novelty to Industry
The years after 1903 show the bear changing from a trade-fair item into a mass product. Each entry below names its source in the list at the end:
- 1904 Franz Steiff develops the “button in ear” trademark to protect Steiff animals from imitation. The first buttons show an elephant.
- 1904 November 9: Berryman draws the teddy bear marching in Roosevelt’s election victory parade, per the National Archives’ catalog.
- 1904 to 1905 Steiff makes the beige mohair bear with felt pads and shoe button eyes now held by the Missouri Historical Society.
- 1905 Merriam-Webster’s first known use of “teddy bear” as a word.
- 1906 January 7: The Minneapolis Journal prints the first chapter of Seymour Eaton’s “The Roosevelt Bears,” drawn by V. Floyd Campbell. The page, preserved in the Library of Congress’s Chronicling America, carries a 1905 copyright line.
- 1906 Steiff’s timeline links this year to the “Teddy boom” and worldwide recognition.
- 1907 Steiff produces 973,999 teddy bears and 1.7 million toys in total.
- 1907 The presidential library’s date for the founding of the Ideal Novelty and Toy Company.
- 1909 January 15: Atlanta’s possum dinner for President-elect Taft launches “Billy Possum,” a toy meant to replace the teddy bear, per the Theodore Roosevelt Center.
- 1909 May 9: Margarete Steiff dies at 61, and her nephews continue the company.
The production jump is easiest to read in one place. Every figure below comes from Steiff’s records or the BBC’s reporting on them:
| Year | Figure | Source |
|---|---|---|
| 1903 | 3,000 bears ordered by Borgfeldt’s buyer | BBC, citing Steiff’s order records |
| 1907 | 973,999 teddy bears made | Steiff company timeline |
| 1907 | 1,700,000 toys of all kinds made | Steiff company timeline |
| 1907 | 400 employees and 1,800 home workers | Steiff company timeline |
How Early Teddy Bears Changed Shape
The evolution of teddy bears in these years ran toward a softer face. Richard Steiff based his first bear on sketches from the Stuttgart zoo. Fustig describes the 55 PB as very dark, without “the cute charming look of a typical Steiff teddy bear.”
By 1904 to 1905, the Missouri Historical Society’s Steiff bear shows a lighter beige mohair and shoe button eyes. Berryman’s cartoon bear went the same way, from a realistic animal in 1902 to a small, round cub in later drawings, according to the presidential library.
Fustig’s description doubles as an identification checklist. A true 55 PB would be very dark, string-jointed, and without a button in its ear, since buttons arrived in 1904. Any bear sold as a 1903 Steiff needs all three features plus documentation.
Where the 1903 Dates Disagree
Three dates in this timeline depend on which source you follow. We list both versions rather than pick one quietly:
- Leipzig. Steiff files the 55 PB and the American order under 1902, while the BBC places the fair in spring 1903.
- Ideal’s founding. The National Park Service and the Smithsonian say 1903, and the presidential library says 1907.
- The lost shipment. The shipwreck story dates from 1953 marketing, according to Pfeiffer, not from 1903 records.
The archive trail for 1903 ends at a box sample and an order book. Until a 55 PB turns up, the most famous teddy bear year is documented on paper alone.
Sources
- Margarete Steiff GmbH, “From the past to the present,”, corporate.steiff.com.
- BBC News, “The great teddy bear shipwreck mystery,” 2011, bbc.com.
- National Park Service, Theodore Roosevelt Birthplace, “The Story of the Teddy Bear,”, nps.gov.
- Theodore Roosevelt Presidential Library, “Top 10 Myths about Theodore Roosevelt and the Invention of the Teddy Bear,”, trlibrary.com.
- Smithsonian National Museum of American History, “Teddy Bear,” ca. 1903, PL.252493.02, si.edu.
- National Archives Catalog, Clifford K. Berryman cartoon, November 9, 1904, catalog.archives.gov.
- Missouri Historical Society, “Steiff Teddy Bear,” 1904 to 1905, object 1949-068-0001, collections.mohistory.org.
- Merriam-Webster, “teddy bear,”, merriam-webster.com.
- Library of Congress, Chronicling America, The Minneapolis Journal, January 7, 1906, chroniclingamerica.loc.gov.
- Theodore Roosevelt Center, “Billy Possum,” The Bully Pulpit, 2026, trcenter.substack.com.
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