Conversations with Teddy

Ebenezer is back.

This is the second night for Ebeneezer Smith as the new night watchmen at the Metropolitan Museum of toys and childhood artifacts KEY in lock. DOOR opening.]

EBENEZER (muttering to himself):
Well, I’m here. Again.
      
This time I doubt I’ll meet any human beings I can talk with…
The toys might be a different story.

But honestly? I don’t understand what happened last night. I have no idea if that conversation with Slinky was a one-time deal—

—or just a bit of bad beef.

Transcript

Musical attribution at bottom of transcript

Background music - Aquarium.  GEORGE (NARRATOR):
Welcome to Celebrate Creativity.

This podcast is a dramatization that blends historical research with fiction, satire, and imagined conversations between people, toys, and other objects. It is not a documentary and not professional advice of any kind. No character, toy, product, or brand depicted in this podcast is authorized by, endorsed by, or officially affiliated with any company, manufacturer, museum, or organization; references to specific names are for storytelling only and do not imply sponsorship or approval.

I’m George Bartley… now let’s have some fun.

Aquarium [MUSIC: Fade out.]

This is the second night for Ebenezer Smith as the new night watchman at The Metropolitan Museum of Toys and Childhood Artifacts.

On his first night, something happened he still isn’t sure he believes.
A toy—Slinky—spoke to him. Clearly. Calmly. As if that were the most normal thing in the world.

If you missed that encounter, it’s in the previous episode. For now, all you need to know is this:

Ebenezer is back.

This is the second night for Ebeneezer Smith as the new night watchmen at the Metropolitan Museum of toys and childhood artifacts KEY in lock. DOOR opening.]

EBENEZER (muttering to himself):
Well, I’m here. Again.
      
This time I doubt I’ll meet any human beings I can talk with…
The toys might be a different story.

But honestly? I don’t understand what happened last night. I have no idea if that conversation with Slinky was a one-time deal—

—or just a bit of bad beef.

[SFX: FOOTSTEPS as he walks deeper into the museum.]

GEORGE (NARRATOR):
He checks in at the security desk, signs his name, and begins his rounds.

Hall of Board Games.
Gallery of Miniature Trains.
The hallway of dollhouses with tiny lamps that never turn off.

All quiet.
Almost too quiet.

THE NOISE
[SFX: Faint THUMP. Then again. THUMP. A muffled “Come here! Come here!”]

EBENEZER:
What was that?

[SFX: Footsteps speed up.]

EBENEZER:
I’d better go check it out.

GEORGE (NARRATOR):
He turns into an older display area—the stuffed animals. The light is softer here. Rows of bears stare back at him with stitched, polite smiles.

And then he sees it.

One small, worn teddy bear
is jumping up and down inside its case.

[SFX: Soft, comical THUMP-THUMP on glass.]

TEDDY (muffled, urgent):
Come here! Come here! Over here!

GEORGE (NARRATOR):
And then something happens that terrifies him, and yet somehow, he expected it.

The old teddy bear is talking.

“LET ME EXPLAIN THE RULES”
[SFX: Ebenezer’s footsteps approach. He stops at the case.]

EBENEZER:
What… on earth?

TEDDY (excited):
Let me explain the rules! Let me explain the rules!

GEORGE (NARRATOR):
Ebenezer leans close to the glass before he realizes—

he is talking, out loud,
to a stuffed teddy bear.

Again.

EBENEZER:
What rules? What rules?

[SFX: A brief hush, like the air settling.]

TEDDY (calmer, gentle):
Mr. Smith… I have something to explain to you.
You have a rare gift.
You can hear us.
Not everyone can. Some people get a shiver when they walk past our cases. Some suddenly remember a toy they forgot they loved. But only a few can actually hear us speak.
From long experience, we’ve learned a few rules about how to talk to an adult human.
Children are easier.
They don’t have the same walls… or inhibitions.
But adults need a little structure.

EBENEZER (uneasy but intrigued):
Rules. All right. I’m listening.

WHY ONE TOY AT A TIME
TEDDY:
We’ve been on shelves and in boxes for a very long time, Mr. Smith.
So we made an agreement among ourselves.
When it’s a toy’s turn to speak to you,
the rest of us stay quiet.
One heart at a time.
One story at a time.
Otherwise, the loudest toy would always win—and some of the best stories belong to the quiet ones.

EBENEZER:
That… makes a lot of sense. Otherwise it’d just be noise. No communication at all.

TEDDY:
Exactly.
There’s also the other thing.
Whatever it is that lets you hear us…
it’s like a wire between your world and ours.
Right now, that wire can only carry one voice clearly.
If too many of us push through at once, it flickers.
You get headaches.
We lose our chance to talk.
So until you’re stronger—and the wire is steadier—we keep it to one toy for now. Two at the very most.

GEORGE (NARRATOR):
Ebenezer rubs his temple. He remembers the throb behind his eyes after Slinky’s story and isn’t so sure it was the fluorescent lights anymore.

TEDDY:
In time, you may find you can hold more than one voice. When that day comes, you won’t need me to tell you. You’ll just… hear us. And it won’t seem unusual at all.

EBENEZER (trying to joke):
You can call me Mr. Smith. I think I’ll understand.

GEORGE (NARRATOR):
He isn’t entirely sure he wants to understand.
The bear seems to sense that.

TEDDY (kindly):
Let me put it more simply. Three little pictures. Three reasons why you only hear one or two of us each night.

TEDDY (Reason One – Radios):
First picture.
Imagine walking into this dark museum and having every toy switch on at once. It wouldn’t feel magical. It would feel like standing between fifty radios, all tuned to different stations.
You wouldn’t hear any of us. Just static.

We would rather be a single clear song
than a noisy orchestra you can’t understand.

TEDDY :
Second picture.
Your mind is like an elevator.
For now, it only holds one toy at a time. If we all tried to squeeze in together, the doors wouldn’t close and the elevator wouldn’t go anywhere.
Better one passenger, one ride, one conversation.

TEDDY:
Third picture.
If we all spoke at once, it wouldn’t feel like meeting friends. It would feel like being dropped into a busy train station at rush hour—voices everywhere, none of them making sense.
We don’t want to frighten you.
We want to reach you.
And that takes quiet… and it takes turns.
I know you may have heard all this before, but it is extremely important that you understand this, and so Bears repeating - pardon the pun

[SFX: Ebenezer exhales slowly.]

EBENEZER:
I think I get it now.
It’s easier if you tell me your stories one at a time so I can get to know you—as individuals—instead of one big jumble of voices.

TEDDY (pleased):
Exactly.

And since you understand the rules…
permit me to tell you a story about a very poor Jewish immigrant couple by the name of Morris and Rose Michtom…
…and the President of the United States at that time, Theodore Roosevelt.

[MUSIC: Gentle, warm underscore in.]

EBENEZER:
All right. When was this?

TEDDY:
The very early 1900s.
Morris and Rose Michtom grew up in Russia, when Jewish people faced terrible persecution—broken windows, fear, laws that pushed them to the edges of society.
So they immigrated to the United States, hoping for safety and a chance to build a life. They settled in Brooklyn, married, and opened a small candy shop.
They had two children—Emily, and her baby brother Benjamin.

GEORGE (NARRATOR):
You can almost see them: jars of candy on the shelves, the smell of sugar in the air, the children sneaking sweets when they think their parents aren’t looking.

EBENEZER:
But what does that have to do with the toys in here?

TEDDY (smiling in his voice):
Toys don’t start as toys, Mr. Smith. They start as problems… or dreams… or sometimes… a newspaper article.

TEDDY:
One day, the Michtoms read about President Roosevelt on a hunting trip in Mississippi.

His assistants had cornered and tied a young black bear to a willow tree. They called Roosevelt over and suggested he shoot it.
A quick shot. A triumphant story. A “successful” hunt.
Instead, Roosevelt looked at the frightened animal and refused. He said it was unsportsmanlike—and he wanted no part of it.
The story spread in articles and cartoons. One cartoon showed the President refusing to shoot a small bear. All over the country, people were moved.
So were Morris and Rose Michtom.
They saw more than a hunting story.
They saw a powerful man choosing mercy.

EBENEZER:
And that’s where you come in.

TEDDY:
That’s where a bear comes in.
They sewed a small stuffed version of the cub, with shiny button eyes, and called it “Teddy’s Bear” after the President.

GEORGE (NARRATOR):
Ebenezer pictures the first bear sitting on the candy counter, between glass jars of sweets, waiting for someone to pick it up.

TEDDY:
I imagine their children, Emily and Benjamin, cuddled that first bear and felt very close to it.

EBENEZER:
I can see that. But sending a bear named after the President and expecting the president to respond? That sounds like a longshot.

TEDDY:
That’s exactly what they did.

Papa Michtom packed the bear and sent it—by horse-drawn wagon—to President Roosevelt, with a note offering it as a gift and asking permission to call the toy “Teddy’s Bear.”

EBENEZER (wry):
Definitely a longshot.

TEDDY (amused):
It might seem that way.

But Roosevelt gave them permission to use his name—though he said he didn’t see how using the name “Theodore” would help sell any bears.

EBENEZER:
I’m guessing “Teddy’s Bear” turned out to be a pretty good name.

TEDDY:
It certainly did.

Morris and Rose started making more bears—first in the evenings, then full-time. They formed a toy company to manufacture Teddy’s Bear.

Years later, Emily married a man named David Rosenstein, who became an executive with the company. Her brother Benjamin was named co-chairman.

A family that once fled danger
now helped create one of the most comforting objects in the world. And
that first Teddy’s Bear is now known all over the world as the teddy bear.

But no one had exclusive rights to stuffed bears. In Germany, around the same time, Richard Steiff designed his own toy bears and showed them at a fair.

Different countries. Different factories.
Same idea: children needed something soft to hold.

EBENEZER:
This is fascinating. I can think of other bears:
Winnie the Pooh,
Paddington,
Corduroy,
Care Bears,
Teddy Ruxpin…

TEDDY (pleased):
And I am impressed, Mr. Smith.
We bears keep track of such things.

EBENEZER:
Are you the original Teddy’s Bear?

TEDDY (gently proud):
No. I wish I could say I was.

The original Teddy’s Bear that the Michtoms sewed with such care is at the Smithsonian Museum of American History in Washington, D.C. It was donated by grandchildren of President Theodore Roosevelt himself.

I am… one of many descendants, you might say.
TEDDY:
From what I understand, the Michtoms admired Roosevelt for his support of immigrants when he was Governor of New York.

Even as President, he said that “If the immigrant who comes here in good faith becomes an American and assimilates himself to us, he shall be treated on an exact equality with everyone else, for it is an outrage to discriminate against any such man because of creed, or birthplace, or origin.”

GEORGE (NARRATOR):
The words hang in the quiet museum, surrounded by glass cases and reflected in the bear’s shiny eyes.

EBENEZER:
So a Jewish immigrant family, a black bear, and one small act of mercy from a President…
…and the result is one of the most famous toys in the world.

TEDDY:
History often works that way, Mr. Smith.
Big changes from very small gestures of kindness.

EBENEZER:
Thank you, Teddy Bear. Your story has been fascinating.

May I add something?

Because many police, fire, and medical officials have found that giving a teddy bear to a child during a crisis can calm and steady them, a “Teddy Bear Cops” program has been established to distribute bears to police, fire, and medical responders throughout the United States—and in England.

A tiny bear. A frightening moment.
And a child who feels just a little less alone.

TEDDY (softly):
I’m very glad you mentioned that.
We may be made of fabric and stuffing…
but the comfort a child feels is very real.
Sometimes the smallest object in the room
does the most important work.

GEORGE (NARRATOR):
If you’ve ever kept a toy longer than made practical sense—
stuffed it in a drawer,
carried it from one apartment to another,
or hidden it on a shelf where only you know it sits—
you’ve already created your own tiny museum.
A museum of one.
One curator.
One story that only you fully understand.

TEDDY BEAR (warm, slightly amused):
You know, for a bear who never leaves this museum, I think about the outside world a lot. Especially about who built it.

People forget that almost everybody in the United States came from somewhere else. Even President Franklin Roosevelt reminded folks that all of us are descended from immigrants and, as he put it, “revolutionists.” I like that. Sounds very… toy-rebellion.

And President John F. Kennedy said that immigrants have “enriched and strengthened the fabric of American life.”
Now, as someone who is fabric, I consider myself an expert on that subject. When you weave in more colors and more threads, you don’t weaken the blanket — you make it warmer and stronger.

Even Ronald Reagan warned that if America ever slammed the door on new Americans, it would lose its leadership in the world. That’s a polite presidential way of saying, “Don’t be silly. Keep the welcome mat out.”

And more recently, President Obama said it’s this constant flow of newcomers that helped make America what it is.

Ebenezer
To put it mildly Mr. teddy bear, I am impressed at your breath of knowledge.

Ah, Mr. Smith, remember that Immigration has many positive effects - United States, primarily by boosting economic growth through an expanded labor force and increased consumer spending.  Immigrants also contribute to innovation, and supporting the fiscal health of social programs like Social Security. Immigrants also start new businesses at very high rates, fill labor shortages, and pay billions in taxes annually, ultimately strengthening the overall economy and contributing trillions to GDP. 

Mr. Teddy Bear - you seem to be quite aware of the situation.

Yes, and immigrants expand the labor force.  They help fill labor needs, especially in sectors such as healthcare, agriculture, and construction, and are vital for keeping the economy growing as the native-born population ages and the "Baby Boomer" generation retires. And permit me to point out one other observation -

By all means go ahead Mr. Teddy Bear - I am amazed at your perceptions.

Actually Mr. Smith, immigrants drive innovation because immigrants are
disproportionately represented in science, technology, and other innovation-driven fields. They even contribute to a high number of patents and found a significant percentage of Fortune 500 companies. 
Increases consumer demand: Immigrants spend their wages on goods and services, which creates more jobs to meet that demand, from housing to retail. And may I point out one other advantage of immigrants.

Be my guest.

Immigrants pay billions in taxes, which helps support social programs such as Medicare and Social Security and contributes to lower deficits, because many immigrants pay more in taxes over their lifetime than they consume in services. Immigrants have a higher rate of entrepreneurship, and the businesses they start create jobs for both immigrant and native-born workers.  I just thought you might like to know.

Thank you teddy bear for your observations
Ah, from my little shelf here in the Toy Museum, I can tell you: the country outside these doors is a lot like the toy room after hours. The more different stories you have in the room, the more interesting the night becomes.

George Bartley
Here in this series, we’re just turning the lights on after hours…
and listening to what the exhibits have to say.

Tonight, it was Teddy’s turn.
Later… there are many more shelves to explore.

Thank you for joining me for this night at the toy museum.

I’m George Bartley, and this is Conversations with Toys.

[MUSIC: Swell, then gently fade out.]

Musical attribution:

Aquarium from Carnival of the Animals by composed by Camille Sans-Saen, Performed by the Seattle Youth Orchestra. Source: https://musopen.org/music/1454-the-carnival-of-the-animals/. License: Public Domain (composition) / Creative Commons (recording).