The Life and Times of the Real Winnie-the-Pooh

by Shirley Harrison

  ‘Whilst we are not altogether satisfied with the solution which you gave to our predicament, we were far more shocked to note your references to the Walt Disney Version of Winnie-the-Pooh, which our society regards as an abomination against A.A Milne (blessed be his name). I have the unpleasant duty to inform you that you were censured, by majority vote of the society soon after we received your letter.’

  For those who raise an eyebrow or who simply do not understand this mesmerising power that a now very scruffy teddy bear has over so many sensible people, he deserves another, more material and less controversial accolade as a fund-raiser.

  Midas Pooh

  Listed on the Internet are dozens of collectors, museums, shops, charities and social-networking groups whose aim is to raise funds for good causes in the name of the teddy bear. The Disney Corporation, too, channels a generous percentage of its multi-billion dollar income to help the world’s needy causes.

  Like King Midas who turned everything he touched to gold, Pooh is one of the most successful fund raisers of all time. The brokers, Merrill Lynch, in New York, estimate that the Disney-Shepard-Milne Pooh merchandising products alone have annual sales of over £3.75 billion. Whichever side of the fence you are on, the Disney Pooh was inspired by the literary Pooh and their roots are in Hartfield.

  In his name, small groups and large organisations alike donate money and toys and practical help to an astonishingly varied, wide-ranging number of charities small and large. You will find them also on the Internet.

  These are but a few:

  Poohsticks Competitions

  The simple game which had been played for centuries by children everywhere was given that name in about 1926 by Daphne Milne. It then grew and grew until it became an international sport. You can follow the Poohsticks trail across the world.

  One of the largest of these gatherings takes place every year on the River Thames, near Oxford in aid of the Royal National Lifeboat Institution

  In the 1980s, the lock-keeper at Days Lock near Abingdon, noticed that the foot bridge over the river below the weir was popular with walkers for playing Poohsticks. He also realised that their sticks were being collected from his garden. So he began to place suitable sticks in a bucket on the bridge alongside a collecting tin for his favourite charity, the Royal National Lifeboat Institution.

  Before long, he also launched the idea of a ‘Poohsticks Competition’ which was supported by the nearby village of Little Wittenham and the local branch of the RNLI.

  When the lock-keeper retired, the local Rotary Club of Sinoden took over the competition which continued to expand, attracting interest from far and wide through press and media coverage. A few years ago the increasingly elderly members of the Sinoden club asked the younger, Rotary Club of Oxford Spires, to step in and help them out.

  Every year, in March, up to one thousand competitors take part in the Oxford Spires Championship event, watched by at least twice that number.

  Oxford university Student Teams from Australia, the Czech Republic, Japan and America compete. International television programmes have filmed the event and it is regularly featured in publications such as British Airways in-flight magazines, the Countryfile calendar, and ‘what’s on?’ websites.

  In 2009 the Championships raised around £2,000. The Club estimates that over the years the event has produced well over ten times that amount.

  One of the organisers of the event today is Dr.Elizabeth Williamson. As a break from revision during her finals, she had read A.A. Milne’s stories to cheer herself up. This passion for Pooh was remembered by friends organising her hen-night in 2000. They took her on a pilgrimage to Hartfield where, with Champagne bottles down their trousers, they staged a celebratory Poohsticks competition on Pooh Bridge itself.

  They played the game with the champagne corks and toasted Winnie-the-Pooh, their favourite bear!

  Good Bears of the World

  Good Bears of the World was founded in England in 1969 by the American journalist and radio pioneer, James Theodore Ownby, who died in 1986. Headquarters were at first located in his radio station, KNDI, in Honolulu, Hawaii, until the group relocated to Toledo, Ohio in 1991.

  He was a man with a mission, believing in the magical healing power of the teddy bear – a conviction that he found was shared by firemen, policemen, emergency workers, psychologists and grief counsellors – his was the first group to donate teddy bears to American police departments in the early 80s.

  Colonel Bob Henderson who had fought in World War II alongside his own bear, ‘Teddy Girl’, took charge of operations in England and became an international celebrity himself. He died in 1990, and in 1994 ‘Teddy Girl’ was sold at auction for a record £110,000. She is now in a Japanese museum.

  In England the charity is run by president Audrey Duck. She agrees that : ‘Although Pooh himself was not the original inspiration for the work of GBW there is no doubt at all that he IS the reason why children everywhere look to their teddies for a friendship and comfort that continues long after they have grown up.’

  Today Good Bears of the World has branches internationally, runs a newspaper and a magazine, and organises rallies, picnics and auctions. In the year 2009 alone, 20,000 teddy bears were sent to comfort child victims of floods, tornadoes, hurricanes, and domestic violence both in the united States and abroad. Hundreds of thousands of bears have also been given to many sick, injured, and underprivileged children and old folk. Victims of the Oklahoma City bombing, the crash of TWA flight 800 and the events of 11 September 2001 have also benefited from its generosity.

  Food for Heroes

  In the autumn of 2009 Pooh became the mascot of a fund-raising appeal appropriately titled ‘Food for Heroes’. This was a book inspired by Squadron Leader Jon Pullen who had returned from active service in Basra eager to help the plight of soldiers wounded in Iraq and Afghanistan. Politicians, actors, military giants – and Pooh – all contributed their favourite recipes.

  ‘Hero Pie’ was entered for Pooh.

  Recipe for Hero Pie

  Difficulty level: good

  Preparation time: 30 minutes

  Cooking time: 25–30 minutes

  Ingredients:

  6 large bramley apples

  250 gram dried apricots

  250 ml orange juice

  3 tbs honey

  200 gram plain flour, sieved

  100 gram butter Sugar to sprinkle Milk to wash

  Method

  Preheat oven to 180 or gas mark 5.

  Peel and chop the apples and cut the apricots. Cook with the orange juice till soft.

  Add honey and leave to cool.

  Mix butter and sieved flour.

  Add water till the mix blends, then cut in half.

  Roll out one half to size of chosen ceramic or metal plate.

  Oil plate and lay pastry over then add the fruit mix.

  Lay the second half of pastry over the top. Wash with milk and dust with sugar.

  In his will A.A. Milne bequeathed his fortune and his royalties, first to his family and the rest to the three causes closest to his heart – the Royal Literary Fund for Authors, Westminster School and The Garrick Club. The Milne Trust was created to manage the inheritance.

  The Royal Literary Fund for Authors

  In 1790, the flamboyant, controversial and dissident minister the Rev David Williams, friend of actor David Garrick and also Benjamin Franklin, established a fund to help authors and their families in distress. The Prince Regent provided them with a house in Gerrard Street, Soho, and with the kudos of Royal Patronage, the Royal Literary Fund was born.

  Over the years the Fund has benefited from the royalties bequeathed by writers such as Arthur Ransome, Rupert Brooke and Sir Osbert Lancaster.

  But it was royalties from the estates of the novelist W. Somerset Maugham and A. A. Milne, followed by Disney’s subsequent exploitation of the Pooh characters, which dramatically increased its income. The Fund suddenly found itself awash with
money.

  In 1999, the BBC reported that two academic posts were to be funded from Pooh’s global merchandising empire. It would pay for two new posts in the English department at the university of Warwick which would explore standards of literacy and writing skills: ‘A.A. Milne has turned so many people on to reading’, said Professor Jeremy Treglown former Editor of The Times Literary Supplement, ‘It is fitting that his legacy should continue to help young people with their writing skills.’

  In 2009 through the Milne Trust, Winnie-the-Pooh was the second-highest provider of funds after W. Somerset Maugham, contributing £250,521.

  •An acclaimed poet diagnosed with cancer, faced with several months of chemotherapy and unable to meet her deadlines, was made a grant by the Committee to help with bills while she was receiving treatment.

  • A short-stories author who developed multiple sclerosis was bought a new computer printer and software to boost her morale and help her to keep writing.

  • Just as a seventy year-old arthritic, award-winning playwright was about to sell her flat because she found commissions were drying up, the Committee stepped in. They awarded her an annual pension to provide a secure income.

  • A maritime historian, a crime writer, a free-lance journalist, a children’s novelist and a literary critic, are just a few of those who have been rescued by Pooh and whose lives have been eased through grants and pensions and practical handson assistance from the Royal Literary Fund.

  About thirty years ago Christopher and Lesley Milne decided to sell half of their share of the Milne legacy to the Royal Literary Fund for just £150,000. Today that is worth about £30 million.

  Westminster School

  The buildings that comprise the Royal College of St Peter in Westminster are even older than the Abbey itself in whose precincts it is located. By 1179 the College was better known as Westminster Public School which meant admission was available to members of the public from across the country, so long as they could pay their own costs. This was a progression from private tuition provided only to the nobility.

  Today’s fees are £28,344 annually.

  Past pupils include Ben Jonson, Christopher Wren, Jeremy Bentham and, of course, A.A. Milne.

  The Legacy from which the school now benefits – thanks to Winnie-the-Pooh – has been used for the acquisition of new buildings and for bursaries to help families of modest means. In 1997 the school expanded further, with the creation of a new day house, named after its benefactor – Milne’s at 6a Dean’s Yard.

  The Garrick Club

  Apart from A.A. Milne himself, the Garrick founded in 1831, counts British former Chancellors of the Exchequer Kenneth Clarke, Nigel Lawson, Geoffrey Howe and Norman Lamont among its many illustrious members. Jeremy Paxman was once blackballed but he was finally elected after an outcry and is now a popular member.

  This august organisation, mostly enjoyed by men over fifty, is famous for its rule barring women from joining, its pink and green (salmon and cucumber) ties and its £1,000 plus membership fee.

  Ladies are invited to attend the Club itself where they may enjoy drinks in the morning room, lunch in the pink Milne Room aka the Pooh room and, more recently, after 9 p.m. drinks in the Cocktail Bar.

  In 2000, the Disney Corporation offered the club a capital sum approaching £40m of which the Club received £30m after tax.

  After lengthy discussion it was agreed to invest most of this money to safeguard the Club’s future, some would be used on totally refurbishing the building itself and a Trust would be established to help cultural and artistic good causes.

  The result of these discussions has meant that about £5m has been spent on building renovations, and £4m invested in the Trust which now gives away around £200,000 annually. Some has also been set aside for the Club’s ‘Causes Dear’. What remains is not much less than the original Disney sum after tax.

  Members did well to remember the observation of A.A. Milne himself: ‘The only money which we are never sorry to have spent is the money which we have given away.’

  The Clare Milne Trust

  In 2002 the Clare Milne Trust was established, also with funds derived originally from the will of Clare’s grandfather. The aim of the Trust is to help smaller, effective charities with good volunteer support, in their work for the disabled in or close to Devon and Cornwall. Children and adults with autism, Down’s Syndrome or any of a number of physical and mental disabilities still need support, protection, care and the promise of a rewarding and happy life. This, in turn, helps those they meet in their everyday life to accept and understand.

  In 2001, the arctophile author, broadcaster and playwright, Gyles Brandreth had visited Christopher Milne’s widow Lesley, for a very rare interview. They talked about Clare and her proposed new charity and he wrote of that meeting in the Sunday Telegraph. Gyles had met Christopher Milne when he and Julian Slade, of Salad Days fame, were collaborating in a musical play Now We Are Sixty in which the very young Welsh star Aled Jones played Christopher Robin:

  ‘Christopher Robin Milne was a phenomenon. He is probably the most famous real child in literature but he seemed at his happiest when talking about his own daughter Clare.

  ‘Christopher told me then that his daughter had taught him a philosophy that parents don’t usually expect to learn from their children.

  “Once we had accepted Clare’s disability, there were plenty of other things we could be happy about, plenty to enjoy, plenty to be grateful for. And at the top of the list was her own very evident zest for life, her high spirits, her sense of fun, her cheerful acceptance of all she couldn’t do, her delight in what little she could. She set us an example. We tend to think that, if someone is deprived of a blessing that we ourselves possess, their life is sadder. But in fact the man who has less than his neighbour is only unhappy if he had been hoping for more and chooses to feel jealous.”

  ‘When I first met him, Christopher had just turned sixty. He seemed older. He was a little bent, with owlish glasses and a mischievous twinkle in his eye. I had been warned that I would find him painfully shy, diffident about his parents, reluctant to talk about Pooh. In fact, he was charming, courteous, gentle but forthcoming.

  ‘He said at once, “Of course, we must talk about Pooh. It’s been something of a love-hate relationship down the years, but it’s all right now. Believe it or not, I can look at those four books without flinching. I’m quite fond of them really”.

  ‘Christopher told me that his chief delight in life – greater by far than any satisfaction he derived from his writing or any pleasure he got from his hobby of studying insects and caterpillars and weeds – had been using his hands to adapt and make everyday things for Clare: a chair, a tricycle, an unbreakable plate, a fork and spoon, a special egg whisk to help her make a cake. He had this fantasy that one day they might launch into business together: ‘C R Milne & Daughter – Makers of Furniture for the Disabled.’

  In a sense it was a fantasy that came true.

  The story has a happy ending: the mega-millions from her grandfather that are surplus to Clare’s modest everyday requirements go today, in their entirety, into this fund to help others who are disabled. There’s a honeypot for many to share at the end of Pooh’s rainbow.

  Clare herself is happy. She is well looked after in her own home. She likes nice clothes. She loves shopping. And she likes good food.

  What does she think of all this money?

  ‘She’s rather vague about that sort of thing’, Mrs Milne told Gyles. ‘She doesn’t know the difference between £1,000 and £1,000,000. That’s rather nice, don’t you think? I think that’s very nice, really very nice.’

  The Clare Milne Centre and CEDA

  CEDA (Community Equality Disability Action) was established in 1988 by a group of parents and carers of physically-disabled young adults in Devon. The aims and objectives of the organisation were to explore ways of providing meaningful and accessible learning and leisure opportunities to disabled
people who were largely excluded from the majority of services on offer, for reasons financial, physical and attitudinal.

  In the early days, CEDA operated from the basement of a wholly-unsuitable old Victorian hospital in Devon. In 2001, they were given notice and began searching for a new site. The Clare Milne Trust came to the rescue and funded the building of a new, specially adapted centre on Exeter Business Park into which CEDA moved in 2004. In the light and airy building they established an IT suite, an art room, a sensory room, safe play room, office space and meeting rooms.

  Children were included for the first time in 1999, offering 5–19 year-olds a summer holiday club. There are now 150 young people enjoying the opportunity to make friends, join in activities and go on outings.

  Today CEDA also provides a wide range of learning opportunities for disabled adults. Activities change regularly and have included glass painting, Tai chi, IT, literacy, sports, swimming, conservation, history, dance and drama.

  The Echo Centre, Liskeard

  On a sunny day in the summer of 2009 a large crowd of Cornish notables, the staff at the Echo Centre, Liskeard and many of those who enjoy the facilities provided there for the disabled, were gathered on the shores of Siblyback Lake, waiting for their special guest, Clare Milne. Sea shanties serenaded her as she arrived to launch a new boat named after her. Bubbly seemed just right for the occasion – partly because that is just how most people see Clare and partly because she is known to enjoy a glass or two!

  Both the latest extension to the purpose-built Echo Centre and the conversion of their new boat have been made possible with the help of the affectionately named ‘Pooh money’.