An exceptionally rare Steiff black teddy bear

Details

An exceptionally rare Steiff black teddy bear
with long black mohair, boot button eyes with red felt disc backing, pronounced clipped muzzle with black stitched nose, mouth and claws, swivel head, jointed elongated limbs with beige felt pads, hump and button in ear --20in. (50.5cm.) high, circa 1912 (generally very good condition with minor wear, nose restitched except for two strands, slight thinning to muzzle, very minor thinning to front of body and seam of hump, right arm thinning between central claws, small patch inside arm 1cm. diameter, left arm with small bald patch at top of wrist and tip of paw, both ankles have some repair, but plenty of fur to cover any damage, very slight bald patches and thinning to heels and tips of feet, large holes in all pads, patched from the inside retaining all remaining original pad)

Literature

See Steiff - Teddy Bears - Love for a Lifetime, Jürgen & Marianne Cieslik, pages 54 and 55.

For a similar bear sold in the rooms on the 4th December 2000, lot 253.

Lot Essay

The Titanic disaster on 14th April 1912 touched almost everyone in England. The whole country was in mourning and there was hardly a single well-situated family who had not lost a relative or friend. This teddy bear is one of only 50 dozen black Steiff bears ordered for England during this sad period. Everything and everyone was in black, including this bear.

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