| About the Book Life on the Farm Lawrence in the War Life after the War Teddy |
| About the Family Aileen Rogers Howard Weaver Rogers Lawrence Browning Rogers Janet May Weaver Rogers Roberta Rogers Innes Lawrence Douglas Rogers |
| About the Authors & Illustrator Bios In the Media Speaking Engagements |
| Teachers Lesson Plans and Activities Marking Rubrics |
| Students Downloadable Family Images Downloadable War Images Links to Other Sites |
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Teddy
Teddy is a stuffed bear that belonged to Aileen Rogers when she was a girl growing up in Quebec. When Aileen’s father, Lawrence Browning Rogers, went to fight for Canada in World War I, Teddy was shipped overseas to help protect him. In a letter from September 25, 1916, Lawrence wrote:
Tell Aileen I still have the Teddy Bear and will try to hang on to it for her, it is dirty and his hind legs are kind of loose but he is still with me.
Teddy was discovered along with Lawrence’s wedding ring and letters from his family after he died at Passchendaele.
In the final years of her life, Aileen often spoke about Teddy and about her father’s departure for the war. Aileen’s niece, Roberta Rogers Innes, unearthed Teddy from an old family briefcase in 2002. The briefcase also included more than 200 letters that Lawrence had written to May during the war.
In 2003 Roberta submitted Teddy and some of the letters to The Memory Project, an initiative of The Dominion Institute, the Globe and Mail and the government of France. Those entities launched a national call for letters and photographs from the front lines of the First World War to commemorate the 90th anniversary of the end of the war.
The submissions were then reviewed by a panel of Canadian and French historians, including Jack Granatstein, Margaret MacMillan, Charlotte Gray, Christopher Moore and French historian Annie Deperchin. They then picked the 10 most significant artifacts and an additional 85 family artifacts, which were assembled on globeandmail.com.
Teddy was among the artifacts selected. The worn stuffed bear appeared on CBC’s The Journal and on the Vicki Gabereau Show. He was the subject of an article in the Globe and Mail by Rod Mickleburgh titled, “It Went to Hell and Back: Mr. Rogers's Teddy Bear,” and was the subject of another article titled, “Longing and Loss from Canada’s Great War” that appeared in Wilfred Laurier University’s Canadian Military History publication in its Winter 2007 edition. The article was written by Canadian War Museum historian Tim Cook and Carleton University Honours History graduate Natascha Morrison.
The Rogers family donated Teddy to the Canadian War Museum in Ottawa, where the little bear now has a spot in a glass case as part of the World War I exhibit.
