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Winnipeg captain behind black bear name Winnie remembered
The Canadian Press — Whitehorse
Olive Patton’s beaming smile says it all.
The Whitehorse senior is proud to be the niece of the First World War veteran responsible for bringing the world Winnie the Pooh.
On the wall of the 90-year-old’s apartment is a clipping from a Prince George, B.C., newspaper of the original photograph taken of Capt. Harry Colebourn in England with the black bear cub he purchased in Ontario while on his way overseas.
A few of her friends make it a point to collect memorabilia for Patton, who serves a cup of tea in a Winnie the Pooh mug.
Her kitchen table is covered with photographs of her uncle and newspaper clippings Patton pulled out this week to help share the story of her family’s connection with the world-famous baby bear.
She said while she was living in White Rock, B.C., it was Whitehorse senior Babe Richards who sent her a stuffed Winnie the Pooh knitted by a friend of Richards’.
“There are a few Winnie the Pooh fans in Whitehorse,” says Patton, with pure enthusiasm, and a chuckle for emphasis.
Colebourn befriended Patton’s dad while they were attending veterinary college together in Ontario, and eventually married her dad’s sister.
Olive was born in 1918, at the end of the Great War, and was so named after the biblical Olive Branch of peace.
Growing up in Winnipeg during an era of few telephones and cars, she didn’t know a lot about her yet-to-be famous uncle, as she lived on the other side of the city.
“I only saw him once in my life and that was when he had an animal hospital in his backyard,” Patton recalls.
“We didn’t know all about this Winnie the Pooh when we were in Winnipeg”.
“ It was only years later through contact with Colebourn’s granddaughter that Patton learned the whole story, a story that has since been well-documented”.
Colebourn was his way by rail in 1914 from Winnipeg to Quebec to catch a ship overseas to join the Second Canadian Infantry Brigade.
The train stopped in White River, Ont., situated between Thunder Bay and Sault Ste. Marie.
Colebourn purchased the black bear cub for $20 from a local hunter who’d shot its mother.
He named the cub Winnipeg after the regiment’s home town, and the name evolved into Winnie for short.
After arriving in England, Winnie would sleep under Colbourn’s cot.
But when the Winnipeg regiment was scheduled to leave for the battlefields of France at the tail end of 1914, Colebourn placed the cub with the London Zoo.
He realized at the end of the war in 1918 that trying to retrieve Winnie would only mean heartbreak for young Londoners who had come to adore the cub from the wilds of Canada.
A handful of years later, Christopher Robin was to become one of Winnie’s biggest fans.
It was Christopher Robin who added Pooh to the name, after a pet swan of his.
And it was his father, A.A. Milne, who in the late 1920s authored the collection of Winnie the Pooh stories which remain as popular around the world today as the day they where written.
Winnie died at the London zoo at the age of 20, on May 12, 1934, Patton notes.
In this undated image made available from Bonhams auction house in London, a sketch showing Winnie-The-Pooh reaching into a honey jar as Tigger and Piglet look on, an illustration that appeared in A.A. Milne's children's classic "The House at Pooh Corner" in 1928. The sketch by Winnie the Pooh illustrator E.H. Shepard entitled "Tiggers Don't Like Honey", fetched 31,200 pounds ($49,770) at auction Tuesday Nov. 4, 2008, well above the pre-sale estimate. — Photo by The Associated Press
The Canadian Press — Whitehorse
Olive Patton’s beaming smile says it all.
The Whitehorse senior is proud to be the niece of the First World War veteran responsible for bringing the world Winnie the Pooh.
On the wall of the 90-year-old’s apartment is a clipping from a Prince George, B.C., newspaper of the original photograph taken of Capt. Harry Colebourn in England with the black bear cub he purchased in Ontario while on his way overseas.
A few of her friends make it a point to collect memorabilia for Patton, who serves a cup of tea in a Winnie the Pooh mug.
Her kitchen table is covered with photographs of her uncle and newspaper clippings Patton pulled out this week to help share the story of her family’s connection with the world-famous baby bear.
She said while she was living in White Rock, B.C., it was Whitehorse senior Babe Richards who sent her a stuffed Winnie the Pooh knitted by a friend of Richards’.
“There are a few Winnie the Pooh fans in Whitehorse,” says Patton, with pure enthusiasm, and a chuckle for emphasis.
Colebourn befriended Patton’s dad while they were attending veterinary college together in Ontario, and eventually married her dad’s sister.
Olive was born in 1918, at the end of the Great War, and was so named after the biblical Olive Branch of peace.
Growing up in Winnipeg during an era of few telephones and cars, she didn’t know a lot about her yet-to-be famous uncle, as she lived on the other side of the city.
“I only saw him once in my life and that was when he had an animal hospital in his backyard,” Patton recalls.
“We didn’t know all about this Winnie the Pooh when we were in Winnipeg”.
“ It was only years later through contact with Colebourn’s granddaughter that Patton learned the whole story, a story that has since been well-documented”.
Colebourn was his way by rail in 1914 from Winnipeg to Quebec to catch a ship overseas to join the Second Canadian Infantry Brigade.
The train stopped in White River, Ont., situated between Thunder Bay and Sault Ste. Marie.
Colebourn purchased the black bear cub for $20 from a local hunter who’d shot its mother.
He named the cub Winnipeg after the regiment’s home town, and the name evolved into Winnie for short.
After arriving in England, Winnie would sleep under Colbourn’s cot.
But when the Winnipeg regiment was scheduled to leave for the battlefields of France at the tail end of 1914, Colebourn placed the cub with the London Zoo.
He realized at the end of the war in 1918 that trying to retrieve Winnie would only mean heartbreak for young Londoners who had come to adore the cub from the wilds of Canada.
A handful of years later, Christopher Robin was to become one of Winnie’s biggest fans.
It was Christopher Robin who added Pooh to the name, after a pet swan of his.
And it was his father, A.A. Milne, who in the late 1920s authored the collection of Winnie the Pooh stories which remain as popular around the world today as the day they where written.
Winnie died at the London zoo at the age of 20, on May 12, 1934, Patton notes.
In this undated image made available from Bonhams auction house in London, a sketch showing Winnie-The-Pooh reaching into a honey jar as Tigger and Piglet look on, an illustration that appeared in A.A. Milne's children's classic "The House at Pooh Corner" in 1928. The sketch by Winnie the Pooh illustrator E.H. Shepard entitled "Tiggers Don't Like Honey", fetched 31,200 pounds ($49,770) at auction Tuesday Nov. 4, 2008, well above the pre-sale estimate. — Photo by The Associated Press
